Comptroller Brad Lander's promised lawsuit against Gov. Hochul for halting congestion pricing now has an actual legal team to carry the case forward, Lander said on Wednesday.
Attorneys from Emery Celli, Earthjustice and Mobilization for Justice have inked a joint defense agreement to, as Lander said, "explore legal action against the governor’s illegal and ill-conceived decision to cancel congestion pricing."
"Elected officials at the city, state, and federal levels fought for years to enact congestion pricing and remain committed to seeing the implementation of this transformative policy," added Lander.
It will still be a couple of weeks before a suit is filed against the gridlock governor, according to Lander's office, but the agreement allows the legal eagles to devise a joint strategy.
According to Lander's office, each set of lawyers has its own purpose: the Emery Celli team will argue that the governor made an "arbitrary and capricious" decision to pause congestion pricing, since state law requires the governor to implement the toll; and Earthjustice will sue the governor on the grounds that the congestion pricing pause violates the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, which requires New York State to take action to reduce its emissions. It's unclear what Mobilization for Justice's angle will be.
The update comes as the governor continues to take heat for killing congestion pricing without coming up with a replacement that can remove 17 percent of vehicles entering the central business district and simultanously provide $15 billion for the MTA's 2020-2024 capital plan. Hochul has alternated between ducking questions on the topic and defiantly pronouncing herself the greatest supporter of the MTA in state history.
“I am one of the greatest champions of the MTA. No one can dispute that.” — @GovKathyHochul says when asked about congestion pricing pic.twitter.com/EwKEaR0oBS
— Jason Beeferman (@JasonBeeferman) July 12, 2024
The result of this great support has been the MTA pausing work on the Second Avenue subway, and deferring billions of dollars in capital projects, including over 20 elevator projects in the subway, the purchase of hundreds of new subway cars and badly-needed signal upgrades. Funding for the 2025-2029 capital plan has been thrown into chaos, and MTA leadership has said it will need to borrow money backed by fares earlier than it planned to in order to pay for work the current capital plan, which will eat into the operating budget and make service suffer. (A decline in service is the subject of an unrelated suit by the MTA's union filed today, the City reported.)
Hochul has been unable to get state legislators to bail her out with a replacement plan — but then again, she has reportedly not even come up with one for them to mull over anyway.
Into that breach has stepped Lander, who announced in mid-June that he'd brought environmental, transit and business leaders together into an effort to sue the governor for trying to circumvent the law.
