New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chairman Patrick Foye tested positive for COVID-19, MTA officials confirmed over the weekend.
Foye, 63, learned the news Saturday, according to the authority's chief communications officer, Abbey Collins. "Pat is currently isolating at home, feeling good and maintaining his full schedule," Collins said in a statement on Saturday nght.
Foye was last in the office Wednesday, chairing the authority's monthly board meeting. He was asymptomatic at the time. He worked remotely Thursday and Friday, following a previously arranged schedule and did not attend a press briefing about the death of a motorman in a fire on the No. 2 subway train in Manhattan.
He is the second New York transportation infrastructure chief to have contracted the coronavirus.
Cotton, like Foye, is working from home.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo promoted Foye to MTA chairman in April 2019 after he was president for two years. From 2011 to 20177, Foye was Cotton's predecessor at Port Authority. Foye has also been Cuomo's deputy secretary for economic development, the downstate chairman of Empire State Development Corp., and vice chairman and board member of the Long Island Power Authority.
The state-run MTA, which operates New York City's subways and buses, two communter railroads and several intraboroough bridges and tunnels, is one of the largest municipal bond issuers with roughly $45 billion in debt. Revenues have plummeted from sharp ridership drops — roughly 80% on subways — amid the spreading pandemic and related warnings to work at home and avoid large crowds.
In addition, the authority stands to lose more in special tax-supported operating subsidies.
Foye said the MTA is facing its
S&P Global Ratings downgraded the MTA to A-minus from A, Fitch Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service and Kroll Bond Rating Agency all put the authority on reviews for possible downgrades.
Foye last week spoke stridently for a federal aid package for the MTA and other
"This is not a time for celebrating or opening champagne bottles, but it's a positive piece of news," Foye told reporters after the board meeting.
As of Friday, two MTA employees have died from the coronavirus. Later that day, the authority announced the distribution of 75,000 masks to its frontline workforce.
