Updated 03/21/2009 12:19 AM
State Senate Leader Puts MTA Bailout On The Back Burner
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Just days to go before the Metropolitan Transportation Authority adopts its doomsday budget, the State Senate seemed to put the bailout deal on the back burner Friday.
State Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith said Friday that his first priority is the state budget, not a transit bailout.
Smith's spokesman said with the state facing a $15 billion budget gap, Smith is worried most about the budget due April 1.
"I basically feel that we're being attacked by everybody for their own reasons. I'm not going to question their reasons," said Smith. "But we offered a plan. That's what we did. If you didn't like the plan, then you come, we talk about it, like I think we should do, like anybody else does around the state. You don't go on the attack mode and try to belittle a person for offering a plan."
MTA officials said the State Senate plan's numbers do not add up, and that the rescue plan would actually require a 17 percent fare increase, and not the 4 percent increase that was claimed.
Smith's spokesman said the State Senate plan was based on information from the MTA. He would not say whether Smith would act before the MTA board meets next Wednesday to adopt its budget, complete with plans to cut service and raise fares by 23 percent.