A half-fare subsidy for lower-income persons would further strain New York City's budget, city transportation Commissioner Polly Trottenberg told City Council members.
"It's a costly proposition – more than $200 million per year and for five years more than $1 billion – and the mayor does not want to make an open-ended commitment of that magnitude," Trottenberg told the council's transportation committee during a preliminary budget hearing at City Hall on Tuesday.
The so-called social fare has been a political football between city and MTA officials, each calling the discount subsidy the other's responsibility.
"It will be a topic of ongoing discussion," said Trottenberg, who also sits on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority board.
Mayor Bill de Blasio, while releasing his $84.7 billion preliminary budget in January, said the MTA as a state agency should bear the cost. Shortly before retiring as MTA chairman, Thomas Prendergast countered the same week, saying the reduced fares are "rightly the role of municipalities."
Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who runs the MTA, has been silent.
The MTA is one of the largest municipal issuers with roughly $37 billion in debt.
Michael Chubak, chief financial officer for the MTA's New York City Transit division, called the matter a social services policy decision.
"It's not a decision for the MTA to make," Chubak told council members. "It would need to be made by New York City or by the regional counties."
De Blasio's preliminary budget earmarks $957 million for the DOT, whose capital program budget is nearly $3 billion.
Trottenberg said the elimination of two federal programs hurt New York: capital investment grants called New Starts, and the Transportation Investment Generating Economic Recovery, or Tiger grant program.
Trottenberg, who coordinated Tiger program as undersecretary of transportation for policy in the Obama administration, said the cuts could endanger such projects as the next phase of the MTA's Second Avenue subway extension, the Gateway tunnel connection between Manhattan and New Jersey, and select bus service in the Woodhaven neighborhood in Queens.
"Those are the projects that would be in jeopardy," she said.
The city, said Trottenberg, has used funding from six Tiger grants to further its Vision Zero pedestrian safety initiative and Fordham Plaza, along the Fordham Road retail corridor in the Bronx.
De Blasio's January plan includes an additional $78 million of expense funds for Vision Zero in fiscal 2017 through 2021 and $36 million of additional planned capital commitments from fiscal 2017 through 2020.
"While federal funds have been an important source of revenue for Vision Zero projects, the president's proposed elimination of federal transportation programs such as [Tiger and New Starts] does not affect projects planned by the de Blasio administration this year through 2021," said the watchdog Independent Budget Office.
Trottenberg urged state lawmakers in Albany last week to pass legislation enabling cities to execute design-build procurements. She has said the city could save millions on bridge rehabilitation procurements.
"We hope the council can lend a voice to our efforts," she said.
