Rich Kassel's Blog
NY City Council Passes Congestion Pricing!
April 2, 2008
Posted by Rich Kassel in Curbing Pollution , Environmental Justice , Health and the Environment , Living Sustainably , Moving Beyond Oil , Solving Global Warming , The Media and the Environment , U.S. Law and Policy
On Monday, the New York City Council passed, by a margin of 30-20, the congestion pricing bill, kicking off an intense week of lobbying for its passage in Albany.
This was a huge victory for Mayor Michael Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, of course, since the Council was the first legislative body to vote on the proposal.
It was great timing for NRDC, too—it came on the eve of our annual “Forces of Nature” gala in NYC. This year, we honored Mayor Bloomberg for his environmental leadership, and he used the occasion to welcome Speaker Quinn to the podium and thank everybody who has worked hard to pass congestion pricing.
The City Council’s vote sends a strong message of support to the State Assembly and Senate, both of which must vote on the congestion pricing bill by next Monday, April 7. As Mayor Bloomberg said at our event, passing congestion pricing in the City Council is “like getting 95 percent across the Grand Canyon…it doesn’t mean anything unless you get all the way across.”
So our attention is now wholly on Albany, where Assembly members are conferencing on congestion pricing as I write.
But while they do, I want to point out that many of the “yes” votes in the Council came from all five boroughs. In contrast to what some observers expected, there were some real leaders from Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island and the Bronx who were willing to step up and vote yes—despite coming from car-centric districts.
These include:
- Maria del Carmen Arroyo (Bronx)
- Maria Baez (Bronx)
- Simcha Felder (Brooklyn)
- Eric Gioia (Queens)
- Sara Gonzalez (Brooklyn)
- Letitia James (Brooklyn)
- Oliver Koppell (Bronx)
- John Liu (Queens)
- Michael McMahon (Staten Island)
- Hiram Monserrate (Queens)
- Annabel Palma (Bronx)
- Dominic Recchia (Brooklyn)
- Joel Rivera (Bronx)
- James Sanders (Queens)
- Larry Seabrook (Bronx)
- Kendall Stewart (Brooklyn)
- James Vacca (Bronx)
- Al Vann (Brooklyn)
- Thomas White (Queens)
- David Yassky (Brooklyn)
Elizabeth Benjamin, whose Daily Politics blog on the New York Daily News website is covering congestion pricing as it unfolds, published a full list of the votes that you can see here.
This was also a major step forward for the more than 150 civic, labor, environmental, business and other organizations working around the clock this month to pass congestion pricing. The folks who make up the Campaign for New York’s Future and the Empire State Transportation Alliance are doing incredible work this month to pass congestion pricing. (NRDC is a member of both organizations).
Everybody’s tired, everybody’s swamped, but everybody was totally pumped after the vote.
Want to help? Go to our coalition's website and take action now!
Stay tuned.
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- Rich Kassel
- Senior Attorney and Director, Clean Fuels and Vehicles Project
- New York City
- I came to NRDC in 1991 on a three-year grant, and never left. Over the...
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Comments
TNgo — Apr 3 2008 10:45 PM
Politicians, Civil Workers...another class of crooks. 2005 MTA Strike, toll hike, subway fare hikes; another gimick for the crooks to get richer and fatter. Now you got their new way of stealing your money.. Congestion Pricing Plan.I tell you all this plan is not a plan to reduce emission only. Its a plan to get these City Hall crooks richer while getting us educated hard working citizens poorer by the day. AGAIN THIS PLAN WILL NOT HELP US REVERSE THE DAMAGED AIR QUALITY BU TO GET CITY HAL RICHER....