Public authorities are amassing major problems for N.Y.: Editorial

Ah, New York public authorities, bless their little souls and bloated budgets, they keep finding ways to sock it to taxpayers, even when state officials try to distract people by proclaiming they have a handle on this monstrosity of a problem. The latest state report reveals the cold, hard truth. Overall, public authorities in New York have increased operating expenses by 28 percent since 2012 — and their debt has swelled as well.

This, remember, comes years after state leaders took a victory lap for erasing more than 120 local authorities from the books. But, as the Poughkeepsie Journal pointed out at the time, that move was largely ceremonial and symbolic. Most of the authorities taken out of commission were dormant and had outlived their purposes. The list included the City of Poughkeepsie Parking Authority, and the City of Beacon Community Development Agency and Beacon Industrial Development Agency.

The state failed at the time – and continues to fail – to do the heavy lifting.

That’s why there are still literally hundreds of authorities on the books and, making matters worse, as the state comptroller noted in an earlier report, they “often operate under the radar and with their own set of rules.”

Some of the spending, of course, is completely justified, such as repairs that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and others had to make in the wake of Hurricane Sandy and other natural disasters that destroyed or damaged operations.

But large salaries and generous benefits, including at the MTA, saddle taxpayers with exorbitant costs.

Over the years, various state leaders have used all sorts of tricks to shift money from these shadowy authorities to other causes. This unscrupulous trend continued last year when the MTA sent a nearly $5 million check to bolster three beleaguered authority-operated ski areas that took financial hits due to warm winter weather. The Cuomo administration chalked it up to an accounting measure, but it’s one that points to both a glaring lack of oversight and the troubling free rein these authorities have to make decisions without legislative approval.

The consequences have been dire: The state’s public authorities have amassed hundreds of billions of dollars of debt. State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli is right when he says the state is relying too heavily on public authorities for borrowing and bypassing a constitutional provision restricting state debt without voter approval and legislative oversight.

Without those safeguards, without a reasonable checks-and-balances system, without transparency, and without a meaningful reduction plan, waste and abuse are bound to continue.