The juice isn’t worth the squeeze for Orange.
New York’s Orange County has had enough of being used as an ATM for the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and now officials want to drop the flailing transit agency.
The Hudson Valley county gets very limited service from the MTA but still helps fund the MTA through payroll taxes and other fees — and the newly rolled-out Manhattan congestion toll is only the latest money grab, State Sen. James Skoufis and Assemblyman Jonathan Jacobson said.
The Democats are now proposing a bill to have Orange “withdraw” from the MTA.
“With only a single, sporadically operating train line for the over 400,000 residents in the county — and continued disregard from the MTA and the chief architects of congestion pricing — my constituents are being pickpocketed left and right,” Skoufis said in a statement.
“I’m sick and tired of Orange County being treated as the MTA’s ATM,” he added. “As the MTA has provided no concrete plans to expand train service, offer a one-seat ride into Manhattan, or offset congestion pricing for Orange County drivers, I am advancing this measure of last resort on behalf of the taxpayers I represent. It is time Orange County parted ways with the MTA once and for all.”
The Orange County lawmakers’ sourness toward the MTA isn’t new.
Skoufis in 2023 threatened to back a New Jersey lawsuit against the then-impending toll program supported by Gov. Kathy Hochul, arguing his county’s residents live in a “transit desert” and should receive a break from the charges.
He also backed a push by suburban Democratic lawmakers to exempt all counties outside New York City from the MTA’s payroll tax.
The legislation for Orange County to withdraw from the MTA is supported by all the county’s state lawmakers, according to a release.
MTA officials didn’t immediately return a request for comment.