According to emails obtained by POLITICO, Lhota accepted a ticket to a fundraiser worth $1,000 from Madison Square Garden, which has business with the MTA. | Getty Emails highlight complications of Lhota's many jobs

Joe Lhota’s unusual arrangement as both Metropolitan Transportation Authority chairman and a paid director at Madison Square Garden and MSG Networks hasn’t become any less complicated.

According to emails obtained by POLITICO through a Freedom of Information Law request, Lhota accepted a ticket to a fundraiser worth $1,000 from Madison Square Garden, which has business with the MTA, in December.


Former MTA Chairman Richard Ravitch said the transaction raises questions.

“Why would I ever want to get a favor from someone who might ask me for a favor?” Ravitch asked, adding, “I would never accept a monetary benefit from somebody who has an interest in what happened with the New York City subway system."

Madison Square Garden sits atop Penn Station, home to the MTA’s Long Island Rail Road and two subway stations. Urbanists have for years argued that the only way to properly remake the widely reviled train hub — the busiest in North America — is to move the Garden, an idea to which the Garden has proven resistant. The Garden underwent a three-year, $1 billion makeover recently.

Further, the Garden is co-developing an arena for the New York Islanders at Belmont Park. Not only does MSG Networks have the Islanders' broadcast rights, but the development is partially predicated on enhanced Long Island Rail Road service.

The MSG-hosted fundraiser that Lhota attended gratis at Tao Downtown was for the Lustgarten Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research, named for the late Madison Square Garden chairman Marc Lustgarten. His son Andrew Lustgarten is Madison Square Garden’s president. The benefit featured “a special DJ set from Swizz Beatz and a performance by the Rockettes,” according to the invitation sent to Lhota’s MTA email.

“Yes, I will attend,” Lhota emailed the Garden's executive in charge of VIP services. "I will arrive late around 9:30.”

Four days after that email, Lhota joined the MSG board. He has also served on the board of MSG Networks since 2016.

Lhota declined to comment for this article. But MTA spokesman Jon Weinstein said, "Joe was invited to a charitable event for a personal friend and former co-worker who passed away from pancreatic cancer. Joe has attended these events since 2002 and is a supporter of the Foundation."

The state and MTA ethical guidelines on the acceptance of tickets from a company like MSG allow certain liberties to MTA chairs. The agency forbids regular employees from accepting tickets to expensive events, according to Reinvent Albany executive director John Kaehny, but grants an exemption for the MTA's chair, a loophole that amounts to "gross hypocrisy," said Kaehny.

Lhota’s decision to accept the ticket underscores the general awkwardness of Lhota’s serving at the MTA while also serving at MSG, he said.

“He is getting paid a big chunk of money by a company that interacts with the state authority he controls — so much money that it helps allow him to work for free — and be exempt from the gift ban meant to prevent conflict of interest,” Kaehny said.

State law defines the MTA chairmanship and CEO positions as one job, but Lhota did something unusual when he took the position last June: He delegated his CEO responsibilities to someone else, in this case MTA managing director Veronique Hakim. He also relinquished his salary, all of which allows him to say that he is a “per diem” employee, according to Lhota, who cites a supporting opinion from the state’s ethics commission that he has declined to make public.

The “per diem” designation enables him to simultaneously earn $1.6 million a year as an executive at NYU Langone Health and to continue his service on the board of MSG Networks, for which he earns at least $150,000, and on the Madison Squard Garden board, which comes with similarly robust compensation.

“You almost need a whiteboard to map out all of the relationships and the issues,” said Blair Horner, executive director of the New York Public Interest Research Group. “Is the system set up where wealthy individuals come in and say they will work for $1 and they can do whatever they want outside of the state’s ethics law?”

The documents POLITICO obtained in the FOIL request also indicate that Lhota used his MTA email address to help lobbyist Robert Harding buy tickets for a Billy Joel concert at the Garden by connecting him to the Garden’s vice president of VIP services.

Like Lhota, Harding was an aide to former Mayor Rudy Giuliani. They met in 1989, according to Weinstein. Lhota gave the eulogy at the funeral of Harding's father, Ray Harding, a longtime leader of the state's Liberal Party who died in 2012. Today, Robert Harding is a lobbyist at Greenberg Traurig, which the law firm notes, “has been consistently ranked among the Top 5 lobbying practices in New York City.” Among the law firm’s lobbying clients is the MTA.

Thanks to Lhota’s intervention, Harding was able to buy Billy Joel tickets for Jan. 11.

“Joe was correct. you’re terrific.” Harding emailed the VIP services executive, copying Lhota.

"Joe connected the events coordinator whose job it is to sell tickets with his best friend of 30 years," Weinstein said. "Mr. Harding paid full price for his tickets and did not receive any special seats."

The ways in which Madison Square Garden and the MTA intersect are not always predictable. Take, for example, the recent kerfuffle surrounding sports ads on the Times Square shuttle.

Last October, Madison Square Garden’s TV sports rival, Fox Sports, wrapped the Times Square shuttle with ads that, among other things, tarred Garden CEO James Dolan’s often-criticized stewardship of the Knicks.

According to one basketball journalist, a "furious" Dolan called Rupert Murdoch, executive co-chairman of 21st Century Fox, to complain. Fox Sports agreed to take down the ad campaign posthaste.

One email suggests Lhota apprised MSG of the status of the offending ads.

“FYI,” said Lhota, in an email to MSG Networks vice chairman Gregg Seibert. Attached was an email from an MTA attorney to Lhota: “I’m told that the 3-car Shuttle train with the Fox Sports ads will be taken to the Livonia Yard tonight (and replaced with another 3-car train) and that an Outfront crew will be at Livonia Yard tomorrow to remove the vinyl.”

“Thanks again,” Seibert responded.

"Those ads were removed at the request of Fox Sports and it was handled by our outside ad firm," Weinstein said. "No one at the MTA — least of all the Chairman — had any role in that. Joe simply forwarded an e-mail from an MTA in-house lawyer without comment."

Asked for comment, MSG spokeswoman Kimberly Kerns said, “We are confident that Joe Lhota acted appropriately in his relationship with MSG in all respects.”