A congestion of proposed exemptions

Daily Point

To toll, or not to toll

Should paying to drive into Manhattan’s central business district depend on whether or not you’re a parent?

That’s up to the Traffic Mobility Review Board, which will hold its first public meeting next week to begin the process of determining how the concept known as congestion pricing will work.

One of the board’s main tasks will be to decide who gets exempted from the congestion toll and who doesn’t. The board, which includes Long Island Federation of Labor president John Durso, will have to sift through 122 exemption requests, found here. 

On that list: parents — and other unexpected categories.

The final decision on potential exemptions will help determine how much everyone else has to pay, since one goal for the program is to generate $1 billion a year for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. If fewer people pay, the toll will have to be higher.

And not many people apparently want to pay.

Residents of Manhattan’s central business district, defined as anywhere below 60th Street, are on the list of proposed exemptions. So are residents of the central business district who garage their cars, all residents of Manhattan, all residents of New York City, all residents of New York State, and all auto commuters from New Jersey.

Some proposals get more specific. One suggested exemption: residents of Long Island battling cancer or 9/11-related illnesses, and other serious illnesses.

Those with medical issues, including those with disabilities and caregivers, received multiple nominations. Low-income drivers, immigrants and residents all made the proposed list. So did people of color and special education students. And musicians and artists, farmers and first responders, judges and pharmacists, union members, people attending religious services, veterans and NYPD retirees.

There’s also a long list of types of vehicles that could avoid the toll under the various proposals. Con Edison vehicles, says one. Food delivery, says another. Hearses, says a third. Those with diplomatic license plates, those that provide social services or help the homebound, and those that offer emergency roadside assistance each could get an exemption under some commenters’ ideas. Some proposals even sought to exempt all passenger cars, all trucks, all motorcycles or all mopeds and scooters.

Then there are those who suggested certain roads should be exempt, like the approaches from tunnels and bridges onto the West Side Highway or the FDR Drive.

Some commenters took a different tack, citing exemption requests they want the Traffic Mobility Review Board to reject. One proposal would reject all exemptions, except those required by law. Others would prohibit exemptions for large delivery companies like Amazon or FedEx, or ride-sharing companies like Uber and Lyft.

This being New York, some people drew love and hate, landing on both the exemption and rejection lists — like teachers, city workers, police officers and firefighters.

It seems unlikely the board will issue sweeping exemptions. But if every pro-exemption suggestion was accepted, it seems no one would be paying.

If a toll doesn’t toll anyone, is it still a toll?

— Randi F. Marshall randi.marshall@newsday.com

Pencil Point

The checkout line

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Final Point

Recharging the LIPA commission

LIPA’s rocky journey to full municipalization resumes this fall with a new set of public hearings as the state commission tasked with making a recommendation to the state tries to finalize a plan.

Time ran out for a vote by the State Legislature before its session ended in June, mainly due to the inability to resolve the difficult issues of governance and safeguarding the wage and benefits, especially the pensions, of LIPA’s unionized workforce, IBEW Local 1049.

While state lawmakers have been reaching out to the union, leader Pat Guidice told The Point that not much has changed. “We are still waiting for answers on how the state is going to move forward on the issues that affect 1049. No one has answers,” said Guidice.

How the new structure would be run and how it would deliver on its goal of accountability also seem to be floating in the ether. The number of board members, what powers they would have, and who selects them and for what terms are still up in the air, those familiar with the process have told The Point. State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli’s review of the commission draft report emphasized the need for further study to ensure the board’s operations would be transparent and its members held accountable.

At the end of this last session, state lawmakers punted the schedule for a required second round of hearings, which now must be completed by Oct. 1. The delay also gives the commission time to put in the rearview mirror an embarrassing episode in April, when the lead consultant from the Atlanta firm GDS was masturbating on a video call. GDS was fired and the commission has yet to hire a new firm, but it is meeting later this month to consider proposals, according to Rory Lancman, executive director of the Legislative Commission on the Future of LIPA. The new firm will be tasked with finding these answers as well as determining the dollar amount of the savings for ratepayers if the profit made by the private utility partner, currently PSEG, is eliminated in the new model.

However, Lancman said the role of the new firm will be limited. “We’re going to do a lot of listening in these hearings … and then it’s decision time,” he said.

Under the new timetable, the committee will issue by Nov. 30 a final report, which will include proposed draft language for a bill that would create a fully public utility. What happens next seems to be wide open; even Gov. Kathy Hochul is in a wait-and-see mode. Once the final report is delivered to the State Legislature, lawmakers can hold their own hearings, rewrite the bill, and try to pass it in 2024, an election year.

“They can address what they want including the wisdom of the whole enterprise,“ said Lancman.

Meanwhile, Lancman continues his outreach and messaging about the fully public utility. He is the speaker Friday at a breakfast meeting of the Long Island Metro Business Action described as being about “The Visibility and Desirability of A New Status of LIPA.”

Here’s the hearing schedule: Sept. 12 at the Suffolk County Legislature, Sept. 14 at the Nassau County Legislature, Sept. 18 at Rockaway YMCA in Queens, and Sept. 20 at Southampton Town Hall.

— Rita Ciolli rita.ciolli@newsday.com