New York City’s Taxi & Limousine Commission should “try again” to raise rates for ride-share drivers and provide clear reasons for doing so, a judge said in explaining why he blocked the increase last week.
(Bloomberg) — New York City’s Taxi & Limousine Commission should “try again” to raise rates for ride-share drivers and provide clear reasons for doing so, a judge said in explaining why he blocked the increase last week.
Manhattan state court Justice Arthur Engoron, a former cab driver, last week blocked the raise from going into effect after Uber Technologies Inc., claiming the commission used a new and flawed method to calculate the increase.
In a written decision issued Tuesday, Engoron said he “sympathizes with the plight of the ride-service drivers, whose deserved raise is being held by a legal technicality.” But the judge said he couldn’t allow the increase to go forward because the city hasn’t explained its reasoning for the change, as required by law.
The commission’s basis for the increase “completely fails to explain” why the commission chose particular indices and time frames, and doesn’t include any math to illustrate how it arrived at its numbers, Engoron said. Ideally, the explanation should “be something the ride-service drivers themselves understand,” he said.
“No doubt the TLC will, and should, try again,” the judge wrote. “This court strongly urges the TLC to make its new explanation as clear as possible and suggests that concrete numerical examples be given, and all calculations explained.”
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