After a Week of Silence, Cuomo Backs MTA Proposal

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and his Democratic primary opponent Cynthia Nixon both praised the MTA's "Fast Forward" plan to repair the New York City subway, announced last week by Transit Authority President Andy Byford.

But it took Cuomo a week to address a key component of the plan: how to pay for it.

"I think it’s basically congestion pricing, a surcharge on cars, normalization of the tolls on the outer bridge crossings," he said. In other words, passing earlier proposals that have stalled in the state legislature which would: 

• add tolls to the East River bridges
• decrease existing tolls on bridges like the Verrazano and Whitestone
• charge all drivers more than five dollars for entering Manhattan's business district.

Nixon used the governor's pronouncements as an occasion to release what she said was her own transit improvement plan. She said she would use the Byford blueprint as a starting point, but would do more to enhance bus service and to make increased car tolls more equitable, by providing rebates to low-income New Yorkers.

Nixon also said congestion pricing wasn't enough to pay for transit improvements and proposed financing upgrades with a new millionaire's tax, a move long championed by Mayor Bill de Blasio.

"Corporations and the ultra-rich have been given enormous tax breaks under Andrew Cuomo," her campaign said. "By raising the income tax on millionaires, we can dedicate a portion of those revenues to fixing our subways."

Cuomo lambasted the idea as dead on arrival in Albany, because New York already has one of the highest millionaire’s taxes in the country, second only to California.

"The Senate has said no. The Assembly has said no. It’s been repeated for years," he said. "There’s still no stated appetite. There’s only stated opposition."