NEW YORK—Various aspects of the mayor’s 2013 Preliminary Budget are being scrutinized, and on Tuesday, the City Council’s Transportation Committee questioned the Taxi and Limousine Commission about the projected $1 billion revenue from selling 2,000 new taxi medallions this year.
“We have some doubts about their ability to raise that amount of revenue,” said Andrea Bender, legislative director for the chair of the Transportation Committee, Councilman James Vacca. “The city has never sold that many medallions at one time. If they don’t raise the billion dollars, they leave a hole in the budget.”
In the mid-2000s, 900 new taxi medallions were sold over a three-year period. In October, two medallions were sold for $1 million each.
A balanced budget is legally mandated, so if the revenue falls short of the projection, taxes or other measures would have to be used to fill the gap.
