The PA will pay Newark $59.6 million in rent, but give New York only $3.5 million for both Kennedy and La Guardia.
The Port Authority is paying New Jersey a whopping 17 times more in airport rent than it does New York, the PA’s new budget reveals.
Mayor Giuliani blasted the arrangement as yet another reason for the city to yank control of Kennedy and La Guardia airports from the PA.
Under its budget adopted last week, the PA will pay the city of Newark $59.6 million in rent, but give New York City only $3.5 million in rent for both Kennedy and La Guardia.
“New York City and New York state have been cheated by the Port Authority for years. There’s nobody in New York who doesn’t know that,” Giuliani said.
“They have two of the worst airports in the U.S. They are two of the worst airports. It’s an embarrassment,” he said of JFK and La Guardia.
The mayor said the latest imbalance is all the more reason for a city-chosen private operator to run the airports rather than the bi-state agency.
Gov. Pataki also has proposed giving the state control over revenues from the airports and other PA facilities in New York. JFK and La Guardia were cash cows last year – yielding $147 million for PA coffers.
“We’re going to continue to push for fundamental restructuring of the Port Authority,” Pataki spokesman Michael McKeon said.
PA officials admitted the current airport lease treats the city unfairly – but they blamed Giuliani for filing lawsuits and refusing to negotiate a new one.
The lease expires in 2015.
“The lease does treat the city unfairly. Unfortunately, the city sued instead of negotiated,” said PA Chairman Lew Eisenberg.
He noted the PA offered to pay the city $55 million a year – but City Hall refused.
But Newark renegotiated its cheap lease with the PA in the 1980s – and is now reaping a windfall.
Eisenberg and PA executive director Robert Boyle also said the rent payments to the city plummet this year because the agency is spending billions of dollars to upgrade the airports.
Under the terms of the lease, the PA pays less in rent when it spends more on capital construction. They noted the PA has spent more to renovate JFK and La Guardia the past few years than Newark.
But Pataki and Giuliani say the PA is just playing catch up.
In passengers’ eyes, Newark has already surpassed Kennedy as the region’s premier airport.
PA figures show that 32.5 million passengers used Newark last year, compared with 31 million for Kennedy and 22.8 million for La Guardia.
PA officials said access to JFK will be vastly improved when it completes its $1.5 billion rail line connecting the Jamaica and Howard Beach train stations with the airport by 2004.
The City Council’s Land Use Committee overwhelmingly approved the rail plan yesterday.