SEPTEMBER 2, 2015, 9:26 PM LAST UPDATED: WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 2, 2015, 11:25 PM
BY SHAWN BOBURG
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD
The Port Authority has spent $1.75 million on outside lawyers to shield itself and its employees from an investigation into whether it improperly used toll money from its Hudson River crossings to fix state roads in New Jersey, records show.
The probe by the Manhattan District Attorney’s Office and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission has attracted much less attention than the federal probe into the George Washington Bridge lane closures, which resulted in the indictments of two former allies of Governor Christie in May. But in an indication of the seriousness and scope of the road-repair funding investigation, the agency has quietly spent more than 2½ times as much on outside legal fees as it did during the lane-closure probe, according to agency data.
Thus far, nothing has come of the investigation into the Port Authority’s decision, at the urging of the Christie administration, to redirect $1.8 billion in toll money to rebuild the Pulaski Skyway and three other New Jersey roads.
