Streetsblog New York City

Between continued raids on dedicated transit funds, a cut to the MTA payroll tax, and the state’s decision to pay for the last three years of the MTA capital plan with debt, 2011 wasn’t a good year for the MTA’s finances. The New York League of Conservation Voters is hoping that 2012 turns out to be kinder to transit riders.

In their annual legislative agenda, released today, transit funding dominates the environmental organization’s transportation agenda. “Mass transit and good transportation infrastructure are critical not only for the environment, labor mobility and safety – they are literally the lifeblood of the state’s economy,” explained NYLCV communications director Dan Hendrick. “It’s high time for our state leaders to roll up their sleeves, fix the MTA and invest in our future.”

The three transportation-specific agenda items are: preventing any additional raids on dedicated transit funds, funding the last three years of the MTA capital plan, and raising the gas tax to account for inflation (state gas tax revenues fund both road projects and transit).

The first two of those goals, however, were also included in NYLCV’s 2011 agenda and if anything, 2012 looks like a less promising legislative environment for transit funding. If the Cuomo administration wasn’t eyeing more raids on dedicated MTA funds, they likely wouldn’t have “eviscerated” the unanimously-passed transit lockbox bill late last year.

NYLCV’s sustainable development goals may have a better chance of passage, however. The organization hopes that Cuomo’s regional economic development councils continue to fund smart growth projects, for example. The first round of grants won acclaim for mostly building upon existing infrastructure rather than promoting sprawl; the Long Island grants, in particular, went to revitalizing downtowns and areas near the LIRR.

Hendrick promised that in the upcoming election cycle, in which New Yorkers will vote for their Assembly and State Senate representatives, NYLCV will be holding legislators accountable for their positions on transportation and sustainability. “This year, we are sharpening our political approach by clearly connecting these transportation goals with our endorsements and campaign decisions,” said Hendrick. “Lawmakers who advance our sustainability agenda will earn NYLCV’s endorsement and be eligible for PAC support for their re-election campaigns. Those who do not, will not – and, in fact, we may well end up campaigning against lawmakers who oppose good transportation investments.”

The state legislature earned a solid B on sustainable transportation issues this term, according to a report card issued Wednesday by the New York League of Conservation Voters. Legislators earned top marks for passing complete streets legislation and a transit funding lockbox, but were penalized for their continued attacks on the MTA’s budget.

Transportation was one of four issue areas covered by the NYLCV scorecard, which can be read in full above. Since the group can endorse candidates for elected office, while no New York group focused solely on transportation can, their prioritization of these issues adds political heft to transportation advocacy efforts.

The NYLCV grade is based on four goals. The group wanted the legislature to stop stealing dedicated funds from transit riders, pass lockbox legislation to make future raids more difficult, protect the payroll mobility tax, and pass complete streets legislation.

For passing the lockbox and the complete streets bills, legislators earned an A. The State Senate brought down the legislature’s score by voting to phase out the payroll tax; because that proposal went nowhere in the Assembly, overall the legislature earned a C on that issue. For taking another $100 million from the MTA for use elsewhere in the budget, Albany earned a D.

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Environmental advocates’ agenda for the Cuomo Administration continues to take shape, with the New York League of Conservation Voters Education Fund yesterday releasing its Albany agenda for 2011 [PDF].

Topping the transportation agenda is a call to protect dedicated transit funds. Raiding dedicated transit funds and cutting the MTA payroll tax should be off the table, NYLCV says. More ambitiously, NYLCV urges the state to find new revenue sources to pay for the MTA’s largely unfunded capital plan, which pays for repairs and expansions of the system.

The agenda also calls for the state to pass a complete streets law, to craft an economic development plan which would reduce the emissions from freight transport, to quickly implement the state’s new smart growth law, and to support a Cuomo-style plan for competitive smart growth grants.

The New York League of Conservation Voters just released the questionnaire that will be guiding their endorsements for state legislators in 2010. NYLCV is one of only two organizations in the state that endorses candidates based on their support for sustainable transportation. While the organization will be judging candidates on their support for important transportation reforms like complete streets and smart growth policies, they aren't asking about urban transit issues like MTA funding or bus lane cameras.

The NYLCV stands out among environmental organizations for its focus on electoral politics. The questionnaire is a central piece of the group's endorsement process; even the strongest environmentalists are ineligible for their support without filling one out.

Transportation and planning issues make up a major part of the questionnaire, along with clean energy and water quality. Top priorities include complete streets legislation, which would require streets to be designed for cyclists and pedestrians, and the Smart Growth Public Infrastructure Policy Act, which would require state agencies to prioritize infrastructure spending in areas where infrastructure already exists, helping to curb suburban sprawl.

"Those are our two items we thought had some momentum this year, items that could get passed in this complicated budget environment," said NYLCV's Dan Hendrick. According to Hendrick, these priorities were worked out after conversations with transportation advocates like Transportation Alternatives, the Tri-State Transportation Campaign, and the Empire State Transportation Alliance. (Unlike NYLCV, the transportation groups don't have the legal ability to endorse candidates.)

Absent, however, are two issues critical to making transit in New York City an attractive transportation option instead of cars: MTA funding and camera enforcement for bus lanes. NYLCV has made both issues high priorities in recent years. Congestion pricing was one of its top issues in 2008, and the group has asked about bus lane cameras on past questionnaires. 

The lack of attention on MTA funding is partly a reflection of just how dysfunctional the state capital has become.

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On the scale of absurd political theater, fare hike hearings in New York City rank very close to the top. Elected officials heap scorn on the MTA, diverting attention from their own responsibility for underfunding transit, while beleaguered straphangers beg board members for a reprieve that depends on those same electeds. It's a cycle of frustration, blame, and unaccountability.

How to change the equation? An intriguing attempt is currently unfolding in southern Queens, where, in less than a month, voters will choose a replacement for Joseph Addabbo, who left the City Council following his election to the State Senate in November.

The New York League of Conservation Voters and the Campaign for New York's Future have launched a voter education campaign devoted to transportation issues in the 32nd council district, a car-dependent area that includes Ozone Park, Broad Channel, and part of the Rockaways. "So many folks head to the polls and they think about how their candidates stand on education, or what their stance is on guns and crime," says Dan Hendrick of the NYLCV. "The objective of this campaign is to make sure that transportation and mass transit are voting issues as well."

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Yesterday, several planning and environmental organizations joined Transportation Alternatives on the steps of City Hall to tout the release of "Suburbanizing the City" [PDF], the new report that critiques New York City's off-street parking policies. The coalition is similar -- but not identical -- to the array of groups that pushed for congestion pricing earlier this year. Their testimony highlighted the range of benefits that off-street parking reform would deliver, from mitigating tailpipe emissions to reducing housing costs.

Planning advocates recommended doing away with parking requirements and "unbundling" the cost of parking from the price of housing. "There's no reason for parking to be paid for by people who don't own cars," said Tri-State Transportation Campaign director Kate Slevin, adding that the construction of parking should be "a choice rather than a necessity."

Minimum parking requirements are especially ill-suited to affordable housing developments, said Elena Conte of the Pratt Center for Community Development (pictured at the mic). "[A parking minimum] really makes no sense at all for communities where less than 20 percent of households own cars, because it drives up the cost of housing and takes up valuable space that otherwise could be used to create additional units or public space."

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State legislators who opposed congestion pricing are shocked -- shocked! -- that the New York League of Conservation Voters may hold them accountable for their positions on one of the most important environmental initiatives in recent history.

The Times reports that about a dozen lawmakers, including Bronx Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, are refusing to complete the NYLCV's candidate questionnaire, and have notified the league preemptively to say they don't want its endorsement.

What has irked some lawmakers is what they saw as a threat in the cover letter accompanying the questionnaire. In the letter, the league said it would use its new political action committee, Climate Action, to support candidates who advanced the group's agenda. Some legislators said they viewed that as a veiled warning that the league would use the money it raised through its committee to defeat candidates who opposed Mayor Bloomberg, above, and his congestion pricing plan.

The league or its political action committee "has the right to contribute to any candidate it wants," wrote Jeffrey Dinowitz, a Democratic assemblyman from the Bronx, "but I am deeply troubled by the very clear implication that a candidate will be rewarded or punished based upon a legislator casting a specific vote the way you would want it cast."

Yes, assemblyman, an interest group basing its support on a candidate's record is indeed troubling. Oh, wait ... 

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