ALBANY – Road signs for the Gov. Mario M. Cuomo Bridge, which were installed last year, are being altered or replaced because they omitted a single letter — the late governor's middle initial.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo's administration is in the process of replacing the signs or installing overlays to ensure they all direct traffic to the "Gov. Mario M. Cuomo Bridge," the official name of the $4 billion bridge connecting Westchester and Rockland counties.

Previously, many of the signs said the "Gov. Mario Cuomo Bridge" — with no "M," which stands for Matthew.

Taxpayers will be on the hook for the cost of fixing the signage, as they were for the new signs and overlays last year when the Cuomo Bridge replaced the former Tappan Zee Bridge as the major Hudson River crossing in the area.

The state Department of Transportation is patching over existing signs, while the Thruway Authority — which has fewer signs affected — is using patches and printing new signs, according to the state.

A spokesman for the DOT declined to say how much the sign fixes will cost, instead telling a reporter he would have to file a formal request under the Freedom of Information Law, a process that often takes months to complete.

"We are currently in the process of installing overlays on existing signs for the sake of uniformity across the state highway and Thruway systems, and to ensure every sign reflects the official name of the new bridge," spokesman Joseph Morrissey said in a statement.

Cuomo led push to name bridge after father

Andrew Cuomo spearheaded the building of the bridge during his first two terms in office, putting an end to a years-long debate over how to replace the aging Tappan Zee Bridge, which had fallen into disrepair.

He also led the push to name the new bridge after Mario Cuomo, his late father, in 2017, orchestrating a bipartisan deal with lawmakers that also saw a New York City park named after a soon-to-retire Democratic assemblyman and a highway named after a soon-to-retire Republican senator.

The new name came over the objections of many local commuters and residents who had grown accustomed to the Tappan Zee name, which was meant to honor the Native American tribe who inhabited the region and its early Dutch settlers.

It also angered the family of former Gov. Malcolm Wilson, whose name Mario Cuomo himself had added to the name of the bridge in 1994.

The new signage marking the Cuomo Bridge sprang up across the Lower Hudson Valley in 2018, as the new bridge opened and Andrew Cuomo was in the midst of a successful re-election bid.

Some of the signs were replaced entirely last year. Others had an "overlay" affixed, which is essentially a patch that covers the original wording on a sign.

After this story was originally published online, Rich Azzopardi, a spokesman and senior adviser for Cuomo, said the governor was unaware of the pending signage c

Who is at fault?

It wasn't immediately clear Thursday who was at fault for the omitted middle initial and exactly how many signs will have to be replaced or altered.

Jennifer Givner, a spokeswoman for the state Thruway Authority, said the new signage on the Thruway system is being printed by the authority itself, not through an outside sign shop.

As of last October, the authority had erected two overhead signs and three ground signs for the new bridge. The DOT, which has oversight of all other state highways, is responsible for at least a few dozen more, though after this story published a DOT spokesman said just seven were changed from Tappan Zee last fall.

“As part of the ongoing process to replace the old Tappan Zee Bridge signage, the Thruway Authority is amending and producing new signs in an in-house sign shop to reflect the official name of the new bridge and to better ensure clarity and uniformity across the region," Givner said in a statement.

Not the first signage issue

Cuomo's administration has struggled with highway-signage issues before.

In 2014, the DOT and Thruway Authority began installing I Love NY highway signs touting the state's tourism programs despite the Federal Highway Administration insisting the signage violated federal law and signage rules.

The state significantly increased the number of signs in 2016 despite the federal government's objections, ultimately installing 514 signs across the state in rapid groups of five.

Last year, the Federal Highway Administration docked the state $14 million in highway funding over the signage dispute.

That spurred the state to agree to a compromise to remove 80 percent of the signs in order to have the funding restored.

JCAMPBELL1@gannett.com