Biden presidency 'very positive step' for MTA finances, Foye says

The MTA’s top executive expressed optimism on Tuesday that a Joe Biden presidency could bode well for the financially challenged agency, but the authority’s "hand may be forced" to move ahead with severe deficit-closing measures, including deep service cuts and layoffs.

Ahead of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s monthly board meeting Wednesday, where the agency is expected to update its budget, MTA chairman Patrick Foye called Biden’s ascension to the White House a "very positive step" for the MTA, because the former vice president has long been known as an "ardent supporter of mass transit."

The election of "Joe Amtrak," as Foye called him, comes as the MTA wrestles with an unprecedented fiscal crisis brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, which has decimated ridership and other revenue streams.

The MTA has been pleading for a $12 billion bailout to be included in a new federal stimulus package. But the U.S. Senate is yet to act on a bill, and the Republican majority has expressed a reluctance for including additional funding for the MTA, which already received $3.9 billion in federal aid in March.

Foye noted that, even under a Biden administration, there may be no "clear path to funding," if Republicans remain in control of the Senate.

And, with the MTA statutorily required to pass a balanced budget by Dec. 31, Foye said the agency would continue discussing Wednesday how to fill its $3.2 billion 2020 operating deficit.

"No one at the MTA wants to reduce service or lay off any of our heroic colleagues, period. No one wants to do that. Our hand may be forced if the federal government doesn't come through with the funding," Foye said at a Manhattan news conference Tuesday.

The authority has proposed several deficit-shrinking measures that Foye has dubbed "draconian," such as a 50% reduction in LIRR — including by eliminating some low-ridership branches, laying off about 900 LIRR employees, and enacting the highest fare and toll increases in at least six years. But MTA officials also have suggested they may be able to put off some of the harshest cuts by taking out a $3 billion federal loan.

The leaders of other transportation agencies in the region suggested they, too, are pinning their hopes for a federal bail out on President-elect Biden. Rick Cotton, executive director of the Port Authority, said his agency had already suffered $1.3 billion in pandemic-related losses, and could be forced to scale back on planned infrastructure improvements.

Cotton called the stalemate in the passage of a second COVID-19 stimulus bill a "tragedy," and said he hoped under Biden’s presidency, "that dynamic will change."

Foye and Cotton joined other transportation leaders to announce the formation of a "regional mask force" of transit agency employees and volunteers handing out face coverings to riders. Foye said, to date, the MTA had distributed about 15 million masks to customers and employees.

By Alfonso A. Castillo

alfonso.castillo@newsday.com@alfonsoreports

Alfonso Castillo has been reporting for Newsday since 1999 and covering the transportation beat since 2008. He grew up in the Bronx and Queens and now lives in Valley Stream with his wife and two sons.