The Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) today announced that the agency has created a new online budget portal that allows users to view MTA budget information in an open, user-friendly way online. The budget portal is available at new.mta.info/budget. The online portal includes short explainers with an overview of the budget process, key elements of the MTA’s capital and operating budgets, and information on how each budget works.

 

“Our goal is to make budget information as clear and approachable as possible,” said MTA Chairman and CEO Patrick J. Foye. “The public has a right to access information on the sources or uses of the funds that are so vital to our operations, and we want to make getting this information as easy as possible. If there are ways we can build on this portal to make it even easier to use, we’re ready to listen and improve it further.”

 

The new portal also includes an interactive budget visualization, which shares key tables from the budget books in a downloadable format. The interactive budget visualization includes these sections:

Information in these segments has long been provided to the public via printed budget books distributed at board meetings and posted online. The new budget portal makes this information available for the first time in a digital-friendly way.

 

Andrew Rein, President of the Citizens Budget Commission, said: “The new open data portal is an important step forward in transparency and will help New Yorkers, riders and budget watchdogs like the CBC better understand and analyze the MTA’s finances.”

 

Jaqi Cohen, Straphangers Campaign Director, said: “The Straphangers Campaign applauds Chairman Foye and the MTA for unveiling its new and transparent open budget portal, complete with budget data presented in an open data format as well as a new interactive dashboard for riders to better understand the MTA's finances. The creation of this new budget portal is a big step forward by the MTA towards better accountability to the public, and overall is a win for riders.”

 

Rachel Haot, Executive Director of the Transit Innovation Partnership, said: “Congratulations to MTA Chairman and CEO Pat Foye on the launch of the MTA’s new budget data portal. Open data is the foundation of an innovative organization, and this milestone underscores the MTA’s commitment to continuous improvement.”

 

Lisa Daglian, Executive Director, Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA (PCAC), said: “We're really excited about the MTA’s new budget transparency website and the overall move toward more open data. Riders will now have more resources to understand where the money to operate and rebuild the region’s transit network is coming from, and going, as the budget is being discussed, debated and dispersed.”

 

Rachael Fauss, Senior Research Analyst for Reinvent Albany, said: “Reinvent Albany thanks the MTA, Chairman/CEO Pat Foye, and his team for a solid start towards meeting the Chairman/CEO’s April 2019 pledge to overhaul the MTA’s open data and Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) processes. Dating back to 2012, we and the NYC Transparency Working Group asked the MTA to publish financial information as open data. We are glad to see the Budget Transparency webpage and hope to see much more MTA fiscal data released as part of a renewed commitment to comply with Governor Cuomo’s Executive Order 95 of 2013, which created the NYS Open Data portal.”

 

The creation of the budget portal coincides with additional ways the MTA is improving transparency and better ways for the public to find out about MTA’s performance.