ALBANY — Hallelujah, congestion pricing now getting big laughs in Albany!
The congestion toll — and Gov. Hochul's ham-handed and politically motivated on-again, off-again, on-again relationship to it — provided the guffaws at the Legislative Correspondents Association sketch show on Wednesday night, the annual ceremony at which pols and the reporters who cover them get to pretend they're having fun.
Like the very best (and, notably, worst) musical comedy, the show features a few jokes leading to the inevitable song and dance number. In the third sketch of the night — "Hochul Screwed Ya" and sung to the tune of Leonard Cohen's immortal "Hallelujah" — journalists played the roles of anti-congestion pricing pols Sen. James Skoufis (the Post's Vaughn Golden), Assembly Member David Weprin (Jason Beeferman of Politico) and Sen. Jessica Scarcella-Spanton (Albany Times-Union reporter Lucy Hodgman, daughter of comedian John Hodgman).
In real life, all three lawmakers are trying to weaken or entirely end congestion pricing. On stage on Wednesday night, their doppelgängers ran through a few jokes before the big number.
"SKOUFIS": Weprin, what do we owe you for the ride to Albany?
"WEPRIN": Sen. Skoufis, you owe me 10 bucks for gas. Same for you, Scarcella-Spanton. Plus, all the tolls.
"SCARCELLA-SPANTON": Ugh! Those tolls! I remember the good ol’ days when the only extra cost of driving through lower Manhattan was if a pedestrian dinged your paint job bouncing off the hood of your car.
"SKOUFIS": And what about my blue-collar constituents working in New York City? They might as well live in Jersey.
The trio then sang, earning the biggest laughs of the night from the 400-strong crowd (though Cohen probably deserves some credit).
“Our faith was strong 'cause she needed us/Suburban voters drive the bus/We’re purple and elections we can swing ya/We cried about the coming cost/Without our seats the House was lost/And after Lawler won, then Hochul screwed ya," Golden sang.
“Remember when she hit the brakes/The MTA had sour grapes/And driving was the best 'til Hochul screwed ya,” added Hodgman.
Beeferman's Weprin refused to accept that the program is a done deal: “It’s a cheaper toll you pay at night/But I’m not someone who’s seen the light./It’s a toll and how I feel is Hochul screwed ya.”
By the final chorus — "Hochul screwed ya/Hochul screwed ya" — many were openly singing along. That included Office of General Services Commissioner Jeanette Moy.
“Maybe it’s because I really love this song,” she said ... referring to “Hallelujah,” um, right?
