Published: January 29, 2008 06:05 pm      

LUCINSKI: Public pressure over Thruway tolls

Someone finally noticed.

The New York State Thruway Authority may have gone to the toll increase well one too many times. Or at least, it went back to the well too soon.

On Sunday, state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli slapped the authority’s wrist when issuing a promised audit.

“The Thruway Authority should call off its toll hike and postpone any future hikes until it completes any analysis of its operations,” DiNapoli said.

The folks who run Interstate 90, 190 and the Grand Island Bridges in our area have been boosting tolls as of late and have another increase scheduled. The man in charge of watching the state’s money now says the authority should watch its operations more closely before digging deeper into the pockets of the motorists who use the Thruway system.

By actually daring to suggest that the Thruway Authority tighten up its operations and look at itself before looking at our wallets to bail it out, DiNapoli touched on one of the many ways that the family of New York is a dysfunctional family.

The New York Thruway Authority might be one of the biggest and most visible public authorities we have, but it is by no means the only one. At last count, there were more than 700 such quasi-independent bodies across the state. They run roads, ports, transportation systems and all sorts of public benefit operations.

In establishing these authorities, state officials reasoned that these kinds of functions could be run separate from state government and could borrow money without affected the state’s credit. The fact that they could also hide political deadwood in high-paying, low-visibility patronage jobs certainly never, ever crossed their minds.

So state authorities multiplied like so many bureaucratic rabbits across the Empire State. The problem is, when you establish independent authorities, over time they tend to act, well, independently. And because they really don’t directly answer to anyone in state government or to the public, it’s easy for them to run amok. The only oversight the public really has over these public authorities is the power of public opinion.

That is the kind of pressure the Thruway Authority is beginning to feel.

For example, local lawmakers like state Sen. George Maziarz, R-Newfane, and Assemblywoman Francine DelMonte expressed hope the audits would stop the planned toll hikes.

“Any toll increase is unconscionable,” Maziarz said.

But is the court of public opinion enough to stop the authority’s toll-boosting ways?

In its response, the Thruway Authority says recommendations in the audit do not come close to bridging a money gap that would be taken care of by a toll hike. It talked about public hearings scheduled for this spring. And it reminded everyone who would listen that we probably wouldn’t be in this mess if the authority, in a 1990s razzle-dazzle financial maneuver, had not been given responsibility for maintaining the state’s canal system and the millions in annual expenses connected with it.

In a year when money is supposedly tight, it might be difficult for state lawmakers to take back the canals. Publicly forgoing any possibility of a pay raise might show that they do have the public’s best interest at heart, but that’s probably too much to ask.

So now it looks like we’re stuck with the Thruway Authority and a canal system that no one wants to pay for. Will public opinion and pressure from the state comptroller be enough to fend off the next toll increase?

We’re about to find out.



Dick Lucinski is the managing editor of the Niagara Gazette. His columns appear on Wednesdays and Sundays.