MTA definitely doesn’t have 600B to lose, so I’m assuming you mean million. And it’s not the city; the MTA is run by the state. So the city can’t use it to pay for other things, but the state can both divert and reappropriate its budget.

Take a look at the third image in the post: both state and local funding from the MTA have been reduced in recent years, dating back to the FY before COVID.

Similarly, here’s an example of the state using MTA as a piggy bank for upstate ski resorts[1].

[1]: https://jalopnik.com/new-york-mta-gave-millions-to-bail-out-...

If you dig in a bit, it's a fairly minor scandal. There are much, much better summaries elsewhere.

I've gotta point out though, the writing in that article is truly abhorrent. This is the weird Frankenstein of The Onion and Gawker that was picked up by private equity, right? The web is a better place without this style of publication, I think.

I'd encourage you to get your news somewhere else my friend :) This reporting makes Buzzfeed look Pulitzer worthy.

I don't normally read Jalopnik; there's a Gothamist article on the payment as well, but it was paywalled.

(I happen to agree it's a fairly minor scandal. It's intended to be demonstrative of the MTA's inability to protect its budget.)

I think you are off by a factor of 1000 - MTA lost $600M (not B!) last year.