MTA chairman to skip payroll tax meeting on LI

The business group Action Long Island had invited MTA chairman Jay Walder to address the organization on the controversial MTA tax, and Walder's office had selected the date -- Thursday. A host of members of Long Island's assembly and senate, and the two county executives, have agreed to attend the event at the Melville Marriott at 8 a.m.

Only thing is, Walder will not be there.

Sheldon Sackstein, Action Long Island's chairman, said that Walder's office decided he could not attend and wanted to wait until after the November elections.

Sackstein said Action Long Island looked on the meeting as a "strategy session" for how to deal with the MTA tax.

"I was surprised they said they wanted to wait until after the election," Sackstein said. "I didn't know what the election had to do with it." "But that's fine. This is not MTA bashing. We're trying to work out a solution for the riding public, the taxpayers and the MTA."

The unpopular MTA tax costs business owners 34 cents for every $100 of their payroll.

Sackstein said that Walder's scheduling office picked the date but then canceled. The meeting will go ahead as scheduled, Sackstein said.

MTA spokesman Salvatore Arena said Walder wanted to appear before Action Long Island. "But they were never able to work out a mutually agreeable date," Arena said. He said the MTA and Action Long Island will try to arrange another date.