Inside the confirmation hearing circus

After this summer, it’s really hard to take the New York State Senate seriously. In the eyes of the nation, they have become a laughingstock, and in the eyes of this New York City-based straphanger, they are generally anti-home rule and anti-transit.

Yesterday, as I briefly mentioned late in the afternoon, the Senate finally got around to starting the confirmation process for Jay Walder, Gov. David Paterson’s nominee to head up the MTA. Walder was nominated when the highly qualified Elliot Sander was pushed out in a bit of Senatorial back-stabbing and unnecessary politicking. The MTA didn’t need a new head to straighten itself out; the state needed a new government. But I digress.

Some of the hearing in Mineola was for show. The Senators took issue with Walder’s compensation — pegged at $350,000 and with a golden parachute of around $800,000 should he be kicked out within a certain time period. It took a chart showing the compensation of transit executives around the nation from RPA head Robert Yaro just to get these Senators to come to grips with the fact that a $350,000 for the CEO and Chair position of an agency the size of the MTA just isn’t that much.

After the compensation issue passed, the Senators moved on to what they do best: sounding like idiots. Newsday’s Alfonso Castillo was on hand:

Walder, a Queens native, avoided details on how he would address several of MTA’s specific problems and said he still has “a lot of catching up to do” after being away from New York for 14 years. But he cited his record as Transport For London’s managing director of finance and planning as a hint of what he could do at the MTA.

He listed his top accomplishments there as putting together the city’s largest capital investment plan in transit in recent history; expanding bus service; developing an innovative and cost-reducing fare collection system; and putting together the transportation plan that helped London secure the 2012 Summer Olympics.

Walder agreed that the MTA needs to become more credible and accountable and rebuild its relationship with policy-makers and customers, and show that the ever-increasing cost of operating the agency is being put to good use. “Simply put, the MTA has the responsibility to present information that matters and present it in a way that people can understand,” he said.

While most of the lawmakers and public speakers suggested that Walder was the man for the job, Sen. Carl Marcellino (R-Syosset) said he was disappointed with what he heard from Walder, especially his support for a recently imposed payroll tax for employers – the foundation for the state’s bailout of the MTA, which faced a $1.8-billion deficit this year. Walder called the tax “absolutely essential” for keeping the MTA running. “If I had to vote today, I tell you right now, my vote would be no,” said Marcellino, who called the tax a “job killer.”

What Marcellino fails to understand is that underfunded transit scaled back to the barest of services and train frequency would be a real job killer. The increase in traffic and congestion coupled with the lack of transit options would kill the entire region’s economy. Heaven forbid a Senator actually know anything about the words coming out of his month.

Meanwhile, Walder also said during the hearings that he would not push for congestion pricing. Unfortunately, the article in The Post doesn’t explore why he said this, but Walder should not be making that promise right now.

In the end, I wish Walder had been more open. He’s had nearly two months to get through that catching up, and he should have some answers as to how he will address the MTA’s problems. We can’t afford for him to learn on the job. Once the Senate votes on his confirmation on September 10, he has to hit the ground running with Albany’s support or without.