If Cab Fares Rise, Will Drivers Pay More Too?

The Bloomberg administration is looking at [raising fares](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/22/nyregion/new-york-taxi-fares-may-soon-go-up.html)for yellow cabs, but Taxi and Limousine Commissioner David Yassky this afternoon declined to say whether the city would also consider a proposal to raise how much the taxi fleets can charge drivers. "We're going to have a public hearing May 31," Yassky told City & State before a City Council budget hearing today. "It's the same question we've been answering all day long." The city supports a fare increase, but the New York Times [reported today](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/23/nyregion/new-york-taxi-drivers-unsure-they-will-see-benefits-of-a-fare-hike.html) that it is reluctant to also raise the so-called lease caps, or the amount that taxi fleets charge cabbies to use their vehicles. Yassky today declined to discuss the city's stance on the lease caps, saying only that the commission will process the two petitions that have been submitted for a fare increase, and develop a proposal for the commission's nine-member body to consider and adopt. One petition, from the New York Taxi Workers'Alliance, would only raise the fares, which would benefit drivers. The other petition, from the Metropolitan Taxicab Board of Trade, would raise fares but also raise the lease caps, which would lessen or eliminate the benefit from the fare increase to drivers. To read more from City & State [click here](http://www.cityandstateny.com).