Of the four State Senators who refused to put a price on NYC’s free bridges in March, 2009 — a decision that’s hurting transit riders to this day — three are now facing federal fraud, embezzlement, and/or corruption charges. This got me wondering: Is there something intrinsic to fervent defenders of free rides that makes them more likely to go crooked? Or is just about everyone in Albany corrupt, and the feds are sending shots across the bow to the ones who might mess with our transit system in the future.

Think about it.

Richard Brodsky, ringleader of the anti-congestion pricing contingent in Albany, vacated his Assembly seat in a bid for Attorney General. He lost convincingly last night.

Pedro Espada, the face of Albany dysfunction, was overwhelmed by newcomer Gustavo Rivera in yesterday's primary. Photo: Daily News

Bridge toll obstructionist Pedro Espada, who came to embody Albany dysfunction and corruption to a singular degree during his ascent to Senate Majority Leader, had just about every major constituency lined up against him — prominent Dems, the unions, and the reformers (though the Bronx machine stayed neutral). He went down to defeat by a 2 to 1 margin in his northwest Bronx district.

Espada’s disgraced Fare Hike Four mate Hiram Monserrate, having already failed to regain the Senate seat he was expelled from, lost again last night trying to get into the Assembly.

New York transit riders probably wouldn’t be coping with worse service and steeling themselves for the third consecutive year of higher fares if the funding plans these pols opposed had gained passage. The MTA’s finances remain ravaged by disinvestment — the agency has a $9 billion hole in its five-year capital plan, soaring debt payments, and an operating budget that the voracious state legislature can take a bite out of at any time. It won’t be long before Albany has to address the unfinished business of securing the future of the transit system.

Will they do a better job than previous legislatures? A lot will depend on the outcome of the general election, especially the balance of power between Dems and Republicans in the State Senate, but it looks like just a few Albany characters will be different. Despite the general anti-incumbent zeitgeist, Espada was the only NYC-area office holder to pay a political price last night.

So it’s especially important that the new faces in Albany stand up for transit and their car-free constituents. Gustavo Rivera, the first-time candidate who vanquished Espada last night, will represent a district where 71 percent of households don’t own a car.

Rivera played it safe during the campaign and never made an issue out of Espada’s bridge toll obstruction. In his victory speech, forwarded to Streetsblog by a reader, he also skirted the issue of New York City’s shrinking transit system. Here is the excerpt transit advocates should chew on:

We asked you to imagine an Albany without coups, corrupt lobbyists, and backroom deals.

We asked you to imagine schools that weren’t overcrowded, and parks and streets that are safe for your kids to enjoy.

We asked you to imagine a community where tenants won’t have to fear homelessness because their rent laws are being written by wealthy landlords.

And we asked you to vote for a state senator that won’t lie to you or steal from you, that won’t enrich his family and friends by placing them on the government payroll, that won’t break the very laws he has sworn to uphold.

We asked the people of the Northwest Bronx to imagine all of these things and reject the corrupt politics of division and personal gain. And tonight, the answer we’ve gotten back is a resounding.

YES. Le preguntamos a la gente del Noroeste del Bronx si se podían imaginarse todo eso y nos dijeron en voz alta: ¡Claro que SI!
YES TO CLEANING UP ALBANY.
YES TO RESTORING TRUST IN GOVERNMENT.
YES TO CREATING JOBS.
YES TO IMPROVING OUR SCHOOLS.
YES TO MAKING HOUSING AFFORDABLE AND HEALTH CARE ACCESSIBLE FOR ALL .
YES TO RETURNING POWER TO WHERE IT RIGHTFULLY BELONGS – WITH THE PEOPLE!!

Rivera gave some promising but vague answers on the Transportation Alternatives/Tri-State Transportation Campaign candidate survey. It’s especially encouraging that he told TA and Tri-State: “I do not own a car. I take the subway in NYC to work every day.” Unlike Espada and the Albany pols who torpedoed congestion pricing, it seems, Rivera identifies as a car-free New Yorker and a transit rider.

Will he legislate like one?

Pedro Espada didn't show up for last night's transportation debate. Neither did his leading challenger, Gustavo Rivera. Photo: Noah Kazis

Last night’s 33rd Senate District transportation debate pitted two candidates against each other who are unlikely to ever appear on the same ballot: Democrat Daniel Padernacht and Green John Reynolds. Padernacht is running a distant third place in polling for the September 14 primary, after incumbent Pedro Espada Jr. and challenger Gustavo Rivera. Neither Espada nor Rivera showed up at last night’s debate: Espada refuses to debate his opponents and Rivera chose to attend an NAACP forum instead.

Unseating Espada this cycle is perhaps the top target of public transit supporters (and good government organizations, and tenants’ advocates, and labor unions, and… let’s just say he’s made some enemies in the last few years). The district, which covers the area west of Bronx Park and south of Van Cortlandt Park, has extensive transit coverage, including the B, D, 4, and 1 subway lines, two MetroNorth lines, and the Fordham Road Select Bus Service. Among all households in the district, 71.5 percent don’t own a car [PDF]. But even so, Espada led the opposition to tolling the free bridges onto Manhattan, all but dooming his constituents to fare hikes and service cuts.

Since Espada’s cardinal transportation sin was over transit funding, it’s worth asking if his challengers are any better. Though Padernacht said he’d fight for state funding for transit at last night’s debate, he told the crowd that he doesn’t want either road pricing or increased taxation to raise revenues. “The Bronx will become a parking lot for Manhattan,” he said of congestion pricing, and argued that higher taxes would only drive residents and businesses from New York.

I approached Padernacht after the debate to ask him how he would find the billions that the MTA needs, if those two revenue sources are off the table. “The first thing I would do is look to cut costs,” he said, suggesting that limited buses could be eliminated during midday hours and that smaller vehicles might be cheaper to operate on low-ridership routes. After that, he said, he’d have to “brainstorm the issue.”

In Rivera’s response to the TA/TSTC transportation survey, he rightly pointed the finger at Albany for cutting off transit funding over the past few decades and forcing the MTA to drop ever deeper into debt. On what to do, however, Rivera showed himself to be an expert hedger.

“I take the subway in NYC to work every day,” he wrote. “If elected to the State Senate, I will put a new priority on public transportation and seek to stop the MTA from borrowing its way into a hole too deep to dig out of.” No specifics, but dodging the controversial issues of road pricing and tax increases, of course, hardly compares to the obstructionism and stunts pulled by Espada last year.

Green Party candidate John Reynolds suggested making the state income tax more progressive to pay for transit and creating a state-owned bank to help build infrastructure. “The austerity measures that are being imposed on this community are unacceptable,” he said.

All the challengers were supportive of efforts to improve bicycle and pedestrian safety. Two intersections in the district, both along the Grand Concourse, are among the ten most dangerous for pedestrians in the city, according to CrashStat.

Padernacht boosted greenways as particularly effective in both attracting more pedestrians and cyclists and keeping them safe. He also suggested keeping unlicensed drivers off the streets by actively seeking them out and helping them find alternative modes of transport.

In his survey, Rivera suggested reducing the speed limit on narrow streets to 25 miles per hour and said stepping up enforcement of speeding, possibly through automated cameras. He also would consider impounding the vehicles of those whose licenses are suspended.

Reynolds suggested that the state devote more funding to bike lanes and pedestrian infrastructure.

The most recent poll for the primary has Espada at 30 percent, Rivera at 20 and Padernacht at 8, with 42 percent of likely voters still undecided.

Monserrate, of course, was expelled from the State Senate and then defeated in a special election for his old seat by Assembly Member José Peralta. Peralta was one of the leading opponents of bridge tolls in the Assembly and put his opposition to congestion pricing front and center on his campaign website. In Peralta's Senate district, 53.3 percent of households do not own a car [PDF].

Carlos Ramos, Jr. and Desiree Pilgrim-Hunter.

In a press release tied to the Staten Island Ferry crash, Ramos announced his general support for sustainable transportation. "Innovative ways to relieve vehicular congestion in the city, such as the 'Yankee Ferry' here in the Bronx, should be explored in an effort to reduce our carbon footprint and thwart potential environmental hazards," the statement read.

In the district where Ramos is running, 67.0 percent of households do not own a car [PDF].

Desiree Pilgrim-Hunter, a leader in the fight for higher wages at the Kingsbridge Armory, has taken on scandal-battered Pedro Espada. Before she takes any position on MTA financing, Pilgrim-Hunter told us, she wants to "look at the books -- the real books -- to look at what's going on and how this money is being managed." 

She stressed that she supported the MTA ("We have the best transportation system in the world, just about"), but declined to give a specific answer about how she'd help provide the transit system with financial stability. "We've seen service cuts, we've seen fare hikes, we've seen new taxes," she said. "Somehow it doesn't seem to work, or it's just a temporary fix. I think we need to look at the entire structure of the MTA and whether it needs an overhaul."

Pilgrim-Hunter also spoke about her last big tangle with the MTA, over the location of a Select Bus Service stop in her neighborhood. She thought that the stop, located at the bottom of a steep hill, wasn't accessible to senior citizens or the disabled. Though Pilgrim-Hunter was successful in getting the stop moved, she still has doubts about the Fordham Road bus improvements overall. "It has caused us to lose businesses," she said, "because the stops have taken away the parking for the businesses to get their deliveries and for their customers to come."

In the district where Pilgrim-Hunter is running, 71.5 percent of households do not own a car [PDF].

The Daily News and the Times-Union report that the Bronx pol who played a critical role in derailing bridge tolls last spring has proposed, yes, tolling the East River bridges.

Espada's office says that more than $500 million could be raised annually from two-way $2 tolls on the East River bridges, funds that would be used to prevent service cuts and restore discount student fares. His proposal does not include tolls on the Harlem River bridges. According to the Daily News, the State Senate will not include the idea as part of its upcoming state budget proposal, which may be approved as soon as today.

So has Espada given new life to road pricing or is this too little too late? A back-of-the-envelope calculation by road pricing maven Charles Komanoff suggests that the revenue projections are too optimistic by a large margin, but the net gain -- about $240 million, at most -- would seem to fall within the range needed to cover the cost of maintaining service and student fares.

We have a request in with the Senate leadership for comment. The Assembly, where bridge tolls pegged to the subway fare apparently enjoyed majority support last spring, has been characteristically tight-lipped. "At this point Speaker Silver is still in conversation with all members of the Assembly majority," a spokesperson told Streetsblog this morning.

While Espada hasn't exactly endeared himself to other Democrats in Albany, his change of stance may signify the erosion of the bloc that killed bridge tolls last year. Note, however, that the proposed tolls won't affect downtown-bound car commuters from his district (only about three percent of his constituents, by the way [PDF]). And the Espada/Ruben Diaz, Sr./Carl Kruger alliance had already dissolved with the departure of their disgraced Fare Hike Four colleague Hiram Monserrate.

One thing to keep an eye on is whether any proposal for new MTA revenue also includes an ironclad "lockbox" mechanism to guarantee the money goes to transit. As we've seen, dedicated transit revenue is not, in fact, dedicated exclusively to transit.

Noah Kazis contributed to this post.

It would be nice to shame every member of the Fare Hike Four, but we'll settle for the two on the right.

While we'd really like to see Carl Kruger and Ruben Diaz, Sr. share the honors too, we can hardly think of two more deserving recipients than these Albany clowns, who scuttled a golden opportunity to properly fund our transit system when they killed bridge tolls back in the spring. We'll never say this again: Vote Espada and Monserrate.

A few other points of interest heading in to the weekend:

• ClimateRide 2009 kicks off tomorrow, as hundreds of people begin bicycling from New York to DC, where they will personally ask their senators to support critical climate legislation. Organizers tell us that you are more than welcome to cheer the riders on as they start. In fact, you can ride the first leg of the trip with them down to Pier 11 at Wall Street. Show up at Fifth Ave and 58th Street by 8:45 a.m. to check it out.
  
• Streetsblog will be offline on Monday, observing Yom Kippur and recuperating from a vicious streetfight with the Westboro Baptist Church. So we'll post a reminder now: There's a big vote coming up on Tuesday, with the offices of comptroller and public advocate up for grabs. Turnout is expected to be extremely low -- make your vote count!
  

"We'll look at it over the course of the next couple of months," said Kruger. ... "After that, we'll finish our vetting process, which hasn't even begun yet, and we'll have a better idea about the timetable (for a confirmation vote)."

When Liz Benjamin informed Kruger that Walder has already spoken of restoring public trust in the agency -- a task that will be much more difficult thanks to shameless hucksters like Kruger himself, the senator replied:

"I come from Missouri; don't show me, tell me. I mean, everybody says they're for oversight and accountability. What does that mean? What does it mean?"

I swear, this blog just writes itself sometimes.

• At the end of his coup, Pedro Espada made out with a $41,000 salary perk. New York City bus riders aren't smiling.
  
  Hayley and Diego's law. Named for two toddlers killed this January by a negligent van driver in Chinatown, this bill would stiffen penalties for drivers who injure or kill pedestrians and cyclists. The day before a major advocacy event in Albany, at which the children's mothers and other victims' relatives were planning to appear, State Senators Pedro Espada and Hiram Monserrate declared their intent to conference with Senate Republicans, throwing the legislature into chaos. The event didn't happen, and the bill is still in committee in both houses.
  
• Camera-enforced BRT routes. This is the same bill that Rochester Democrat David Gantt killed in his transportation committee last year. It would enable New York City to enforce 50 miles of exclusive BRT routes by mounting cameras on buses. Similar cameras have sped bus trips in London significantly. Between the protracted MTA funding debate and the Senate's utter collapse, however, the campaign to convince Gantt of the need for this bill never really got off the ground. Transportation advocates plan to push for the bill again in January.
• Complete Streets. There's a bill in both houses that would require transportation projects to include pedestrian and bicycle access. AARP and the New York Bicycle Coalition have campaigned strongly for the bill, which is sponsored by the transportation committee chairs in each house. The bill did not come up for a vote in Gantt's committee, however, so it looks like we'll be waiting until next year for any movement on this one.
  

There is one piece of legislation related to safer streets potentially en route to becoming law this week: The safe driving bill that passed the Assembly last month. Martin Dilan, chair of the Senate transportation committee, wants to move the bill this week, said his Albany office. Aimed primarily at young and inexperienced drivers, the bill would penalize distracted driving, including texting while driving, but it does not rise to the level of an outright texting ban. A provision inserted in the Assembly would prevent police from issuing a ticket for "inattentive driving" unless the driver was observed committing another violation at the same time.

Distracted driving contributes to more than 10,000 crashes per year in New York State. Apparently, Albany doesn't think that's a big enough hazard to justify pulling drivers over.

It's hard to make out through the tinted glass, but Pedro Espada is holding a baby in front of his face to block the CBS2 cameras.

"He's there a long time. Yeah, he's there all week," neighbor Benny Protano said.

CBS 2 HD undercover video found cars registered to Espada parked in his Mamaroneck driveway at night and again the next morning, indicating that he slept in Mamaroneck.

Espada does own a co-op in the Bronx -- at 325 East 201st St.

Members of the co-op board told CBS 2 HD that while Sen. Espada owns an apartment there he doesn't live here.

I suppose this helps to explain why New York City's State Senate delegation seems so willing to saddle transit riders with half-baked schemes to fund the MTA. The taxi surcharge to fund out-of-town roads and bridges is even starting to make sense.

More than seventy percent of the New Yorkers whom Espada purports to represent don't own cars. That's not how Espada rolls, however:

He also said that when he is in Albany one of his cars is "always parked outside" Mamaroneck or the Bronx because he can only drive one car at a time.

But during the time CBS 2 HD watched Espada's Mamaroneck house both his cars were parked there.

This news probably isn't going over well with voters in the 33rd, and legally speaking, Kramer reports, Espada's choice of primary residence violates the state constitution. Still, with the State Senate's latest toll-less transit plan alive in Albany, on balance it's been a good day for Pedro Espada.

Well, here we are again.

One year after State Assembly Democrats killed New York City’s attempt to fund mass transit and reduce traffic gridlock, sustainable transport advocates find themselves suffering yet another huge defeat in Albany.

Fixing Albany requires volunteers dragging themselves out to the Kings Highway Q train platform in the middle of Carl Kruger’s district and handing palm cards to commuters explaining that the impending fare hike is the direct result of their state senator’s fine work.

On Wednesday the MTA Board approved the “doomsday” scenario – massive fare hikes and sweeping service cuts for New York City’s eight million transit riders. The State Legislature easily could have avoided doomsday by approving Richard Ravitch’s financing plan or coming up with a viable alternative of its own. But a handful of New York City State Senators, Carl Kruger, Ruben Diaz Sr., Pedro Espada and Hiram Monserrate – call them the Fare Hike Four – couldn’t bear the thought of imposing new fees on New York City’s motorists. In working to protect the free driving privilege of New York City’s armada of horn-honking, exhaust-spewing, road-clogging single-passenger car commuters, the State Senate has brought the city’s transit system to the brink of financial ruin. If you ride a train or bus in New York City you're going to pay the price.

The irresponsibility, the destructiveness and sheer lack of seriousness displayed by the Fare Hike Four is without question and we could spend all day heaping scorn on them. But the Senate Democrats are hardly any worse than the minority Republicans who were perfectly happy to sit by and watch the train wreck. And we could just as well place the blame for our current mess on the State Assembly members who killed congestion pricing last year.

Rather than pointing fingers at our feckless state government, advocates for livable streets and mass transit need to take a good long look in the mirror. Despite assembling a broad and seemingly powerful coalition in support of our issues, our advocacy consistently goes nowhere in Albany. That needs to change. So, how?

First off, it’s obvious that we need a better policy-making process. Granted, New York’s state legislators tend to show a profound lack of seriousness when it comes to policy (see their performance on last year’s congestion mitigation commission) and they are renowned for their deeply ingrained windshield perspective. But they still need to be engaged in the process from the beginning. It didn't help that the Ravitch Plan was, in many ways, too small, too lacking in creativity and too flawed for anyone to get too excited about it. The fact that the Ravitch Plan originated outside the state legislature made it all the more easy for them to reject it.

But let’s also be clear that our losses in Albany have a lot more to do with politics than policy. Sustainable transport advocates need to build political clout. Period. At this point, almost nothing else matters. We need to join forces with mainstream environmentalists, labor groups and issue advocates working on education, housing and economic development, who are equally disgusted with the performance of New York’s state legislature. The Fare Hike Four and the Assembly Democrats who killed congestion pricing come up for reelection every two years. For the most part, they run unopposed. Until we can get some of these people unelected – or, at the very least, challenged – we are pretty much irrelevant.

Here at Streetsblog we are mostly issue advocates and wonks. We enjoy debating policy minutia in the comments section, geeking out at Rudin Center breakfasts and fleshing out the most rational possible pricing schemes for New York City’s transportation system. But fixing Albany demands less policy intellect and more political muscle. It requires volunteers dragging themselves out to the Kings Highway Q train platform in the middle of Carl Kruger’s district and handing out palm cards to morning rush hour commuters explaining that the impending fare hike is the direct result of their state senator’s fine work -- or total lack thereof. It’s about knocking on doors, spending evenings at community meetings and drumming up votes. Defeating Albany incumbents isn’t easy. Most of these guys leave office in handcuffs or a coffin. But state legislators aren’t invincible either. A lot of them have had their jobs for more than 20 years. Many of them are stale and feeble and don’t work particularly hard anymore. Daniel Squadron knocked off Sen. Martin Connor in last September’s Democratic primary by a margin of 8,034 to 6,179. It doesn’t take a lot of votes.

Still, it’s a daunting task for any individual community activist to run a campaign against a sitting state legislator. So, here’s my humble proposal: What New York needs right now is a well-organized, heavily-funded, Newt-Gingrich-Contract-With-America-style campaign to take back Albany. We need to create a broad-based reform platform and recruit a slate of viable candidates to run challenges against vulnerable Senators and Assembly members all across the city. We need to focus citywide attention on state legislature campaigns and stop letting these guys slip quietly back into office unchallenged year after year in neighborhood-level campaigns that no one even pays attention to. We’ve got to take Albany back from these people who are ruining our city.

Photo by Buck Ennis

Without new financial help from Albany soon, the MTA says its current bad finances may mean another fare hike in 2010.

That would make it three years in a row for fare increases -- March 2008, June 2009 and early 2010 -- the worst record in the MTA's 40-plus year history.

It demonstrates a trend of shifting the costs of operating transit from some beneficiaries of the subways and buses -- such as motorists and businesses -- onto riders.  For example, the riders' share of operating costs for the subways will go from 69% to an astonishing 84%, according to the MTA, if the just-approved fare increases are implemented.

Under the plan proposed by former MTA chairman Richard Ravitch, no new fare hike would occur before 2011.

Meanwhile, the excuses for inaction are pouring in. GOP State Senator Marty Golden, a Brooklyn rep who never broke ranks to support the Ravitch plan, sent around a press release blaming the state's top Democrats for "closing the doors completely to Republicans." Senate Minority Leader Dean Skelos excused his party's monolithic opposition to the transit rescue effort in much the same way, and added that the MTA was asking for a "blank check" by seeking to fund its five-year capital program. As Liz Benjamin notes, that's exactly what the Fare Hike Four and Senate Dems have been saying.

It's a patently false claim. Any plan is subject to oversight and approval by the Capital Program Review Board. The leaders of the State Senate and the Assembly each appoint one voting member to the CPRB, as do the mayor and the governor. Any of the four voting members can veto the whole thing. Said Russianoff: "If they appropriated the money, they would still have power over how it's spent."

Because a handful of state senators representing New York City refused to back a credible plan to fund our transit system, the MTA's March 25th deadline has come and gone without any reprieve for everyone who relies on subways and buses. Head over to City Room for scenes from the final act.

Pedro Espada photo: John DeSio

Barring a viable MTA rescue plan, the 140,000 transit riders in Ruben Diaz. Sr.'s district will lose the Bx4 and the Bx14

Not that the Fare Hike Four concern themselves with facts and data, but in Ruben Diaz, Sr.'s Bronx district, maps show the planned elimination of bus lines Bx4 and Bx14, as well as altered or reduced service on seven additional routes. Not to mention increased wait times on the 4, 5, and 6 subway lines. Constituents of Hiram Monserrate, Pedro Espada, Jr., and Carl Kruger all face cutbacks and service eliminations as well.

With GOP senators indicating a willingness to negotiate, there may yet be an outside chance to salvage a workable, long-term MTA rescue plan. There's still time to remind your legislators what you, and the city, stand to lose without it.

OK, we have a winner of yesterday's photo caption contest. Democratic State Senators Hiram Monserrate, Carl Kruger, Pedro Espada, Jr. and Ruben Diaz, Sr. will henceforth be known as "The Fare Hike Four."

While we're at it, we figure if the State Senate is going to treat New York City's transit riders like clowns and turn the MTA funding process into a year-long circus, we're going to need a good graphic to go with the story. So, here's what Livable Streets Initiative graphic design genius Carly Clark came up with. From left-to-right that's Monserrate playing the role of the abusive Moe, Kruger as the developmentally-impaired Curly, Espada as Shemp, and Diaz as the bumbling but lovable Larry. 

We'll have travel mugs and t-shirts printed up soon so you can ride with the Fare Hike Four on your morning commute.

Pedro Espada photo: John DeSio

I asked for this thoughts.

"I'm elated," he said. "Today's a great day for Pedro Espada, the M.T.A. ridership and the State Senate."

I asked if I should read anything into him listing his own name before the M.T.A ridership. He slapped me on the back and replied "only that you're very imaginative."

The State Senators (for convenience sake, let just refer to them "The Fare Hike Four" from now on) say they can satisfy the MTA’s short-term financing needs with a four percent fare and toll hike and a small payroll tax increase. The MTA says that math doesn’t work, according to Reuters:

The MTA’s chairman, H. Dale Hemmerdinger, estimated the
Senate plan would force the agency to raise fares and tolls by
17 percent — about four times more than the Senate calculated
– as it would only raise about $1 billion more.

I suppose it comes down to a question of who do you trust more with the numbers, Richard Ravitch or four venal, old pols in the nation’s most dysfunctional state legislature? If that’s a tough call for you, then it’s probably worth noting that Ravitch spent considerably more time working out his financing plan than did The Fare Hike Four. As Kathy Wylde at the Parternship for New York City says:

The State Senate has had almost a year to join the public discussion of funding for the transportation system. They waited until the very end of the process to come forward with a proposal that provides not a nickel for system maintenance and badly needed expansion of bus service, let alone a full capital program. It is time for both sides of the Senate — Democrat and Republican — to join the Governor and the Assembly in support of some version of the Ravitch Commission Plan.

Hat tip to Liz Benjamin at the Daily Politics for this snapshot of four state senators who've helped concoct a stopgap, toll-less MTA funding plan that does nothing to address the imminent decline of New York's transit system. Lest they be accused of completely shortchanging the future, they say maintenance and expansion can be taken care of next year, by raising personal income taxes throughout the 12-county MTA region. Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith is calling it all "sound practice." Politicker's Jimmy Vielkind has more from Smith.

The grinners, from left to right, are Carl Kruger, Ruben Diaz, Sr., Pedro Espada, Jr., and Hiram Monserrate (yes, that Hiram Monserrate). When these men held the Democratic takeover of the Senate hostage, they styled themselves the "four amigos." Now that they've done their level best to hamper investment in subways and buses, all to preserve a free ride to Manhattan for the car-driving minority, I think it's time for a new nickname. Something to do with horsemen, perhaps?

I am very concerned to hear that Senators Carl Kruger; Pedro Espada, Jr.; and Ruben Diaz, Sr. will refuse to pass a transit rider rescue plan like those proposed by Governor Paterson and Speaker Silver, if that plan includes any new tolls.

These senators have made it clear what they oppose, so I'm writing to make sure you know what I, as your constituent, oppose.

* I oppose increasing fares by 23%;
* I oppose shutting down entire subway lines;
* I oppose discontinuing dozens of bus routes in every borough;
* And I oppose longer waits and overcrowding.

The Campaign is urging transit-supporting New Yorkers to send their messages today.

The Three Amigos -- Sens. Carl Kruger, Pedro Espada Jr. and Ruben Diaz Sr. -- who recently reaffirmed their relationship and started strategizing again as a team, today issued a joint statement demanding that the MTA go "back to the drawing board" and do everything possible to avoid tolling the East and Harlem river bridges.

The three senators are "demanding" that the MTA agree to a forensic audit conducted by an outside entity and a complete accounting of all its assets - including real estate holdings, which is an issue other lawmakers have been hammering on for a while now.

The trio is open to the idea of a payroll tax, which is the other revenue-generating proposal made by the Ravitch Commission, but called the tolls a "non-starter."

With the Democratic majority hanging by a minuscule 32-30 thread and Republicans showing no signs of breaking ranks to support the Ravitch proposals, it would take a unified front in the Senate to pass the rescue plan. The brazen disregard for transit riders displayed by these three lawmakers could very well torpedo any chance to stave off drastic fare hikes and service cuts, shore up the MTA's finances, and keep the subways from slipping into a state of decline.

To better appreciate the fundamental absurdity of their arguments, follow the jump or, better yet, read Liz's full post.

What the amigos might want in exchange (albeit not formally, because that's illegal) for their support of the MTA bailout is unclear.

During an interview yesterday, I asked Diaz Sr. whether he could ever see his way clear to supporting tolls, and he seemed to be open to it - but only if someone would "explain to me, please" how camera technology is going to make sure drivers from out of state pay their fair share.

"Why should I be punishing my state and the people from my district?" Diaz Sr. said. "As soon as the people from my district and the people of New York are protected, I will support anything that doesn't punish the need ones."

Diaz Sr. then insisted to me that there are "other ways" to generate and/or save the revenue necessary to stave off massive fare and toll hikes. He mentioned two of his own bills - one that would require the state to buy prescription drugs from Canada and another that would force ConEd to pay taxes - for starters.