Council backs Fair Fares expansion to cover 100% of subway, bus costs for 1.3M New Yorkers

The City Council wants to expand the Fair Fares program so more than 1 million eligible New Yorkers would be able to ride Big Apple subways and buses all on the government’s dime.

The city-funded program reimburses the MTA for 50% of the fare — a cost those earning up to 150% of the federal poverty level aren’t required to pay out of pocket — which the council has proposed covering entirely in its city budget response.

The council’s response does not detail how much it would need to fully cover those fares, but advocates at the Permanent Citizens Advisory Committee to the MTA estimate that changing Fair Fares from a 50% discount to a full fare subsidy would run the city about $150 million to $175 million a year on top of current funding levels.

Individuals making up to $23,475 annually and a family of four earning $48,225 are eligible.

There are 360,000 New Yorkers currently enrolled in the program and as many as 1.3 million eligible for it, according to the PCAC.

The council’s proposal stands in direct opposition to Mayor Zohran Mamdani who has said he does not support an expansion of Fair Fares — instead favoring to make buses free for all New Yorkers regardless of income level.

Gov. Kathy Hochul has said she doesn’t support Mamdani’s pie in the sky plan.

If Albany doesn’t help fulfill the mayor’s pledge of free buses, he would need to find around $800 million within the already strained city budget to fund it.

The council, in its budget response, also accused Mamdani of underfunding the MTA in his preliminary budget and vowed to restore support for the agency. 

The New York City Comptroller’s office said Mamdani’s initial budget plan shortchanged the MTA by $621 million.

The council also targeted a specific MTA-related expense for savings. The Metropolitan Commuter Transportation Mobility Tax is a payroll tax employers pay to support the authority. 

New York City pays the tax on its own workforce, and Mamdani’s preliminary plan budgeted $141.5 million for it in fiscal year 2026 and $142.7 million in fiscal year 2027. 

The Council argued those amounts are more than what the city will actually owe based on recent trends and proposed “rightsizing” the line item, which it estimates would save $26 million in 2026 and $18 million in 2027.