ALBANY

THRUWAY AUTHORITY STARTS HEARINGS ON TOLL HIKES

The New York Thruway Authority begins a series of public hearings today on its proposal to raise fees on the nation’s longest toll road for the first time in 17 years, a move that doesn’t sit well with the trucking industry.

“We are having a public conversation about what needs to be done to insure the Thruway continues to play its vital role in the transportation system across New York state,” said Michael Fleischer, executive director of the authority.

Under the authority’s plan, tolls on the 641-mile Thruway would rise by 25% for passenger vehicles and by an average 35% for commercial vehicles. Smaller increases would be imposed on regular and commercial vehicles using the automatic EZPass system of payment. Mr. Fleischer said the extra money – expected to be about $150 million annually – is needed to properly maintain the system and make improvements that will include, among other things, more E-ZPass lanes, highway speed E-ZPass, improved toll plazas, and expanded rest areas for truckers.

Following today’s public hearing at Buffalo, the Thruway Authority will hold sessions at Syracuse on Tuesday and Albany on Wednesday. The final public hearing will be held April 11 at Suffern, Rockland County.

– Associated Press

CITYWIDE

COMPUTER TRANSITION PROMPTS SUN TO REQUEST TEMPORARY AUDIT SUSPENSION

The New York Sun, citing problems arising from the conversion to a new computer system, has requested a Temporary Suspension of Service from the Audit Bureau of Circulation.

The newspaper said its request arose from issues related to the installation of a new circulation software system in March of 2004, which led both the Sun and the ABC to determine that the Sun’s circulation records were un-auditable.

“Although the system issues have been recently resolved with the vendor certain records could not be recovered for the audit period,” according to August Fields, director of circulation and marketing for the Sun.

The action by the Sun is in accordance with established ABC guidelines and precedents and takes advantage of a provision of ABC Bylaw 2.16, under which the Sun and the ABC have agreed that a re-instatement audit will be completed during the summer of 2005. Successful completion of the re-instatement audit will be followed by a Publisher’s Statement filing in September 2005.

“A TSOS is not rare or unusual,” Mr. Fields said. “The rule exists, in part, to deal with cases where systems installations or upgrades don’t proceed smoothly or as planned. A TSOS has been agreed to at large and small newspapers, currently and in the past, who have experienced precisely the kinds of technological problems we have,” continued Mr. Fields. “We appreciate the bureau’s guidance and advice and look forward to the auditor’s return in the summer.”

– Sun Staff

QUEENS

WOMEN SET TO TESTIFY AGAINST ALLEGED SEX TRAFFICKERS

The poor, uneducated teenager was easy prey for Josue Flores Carreto when they met in 1998 at a pastry shop where she worked in central Mexico.

Amid promises of a better life, they wed in 2001. What followed was beatings, threats, and sex with strangers far from home.

Her version of the courtship’s dark turn, which Mr. Carreto disputes, has become crucial to an unusual federal case accusing him and a crew of fellow predators of forcing Mexican women like his bride into prostitution. Authorities say some of the victims were smuggled into New York in a scheme that made the international ring hundreds of thousands of dollars while leaving them penniless.

Carreto, 37, his brother Gerardo Flores Carreto, 33, and Daniel Perez Alonso, 25, all Mexican nationals, were arrested last year after immigration agents targeted the prostitution ring’s American outpost – two dingy apartments at Queens. The men, who pleaded not guilty to sex trafficking charges, are to go on trial today in federal court at Brooklyn.

Prosecutors plan to put some of the alleged victims on the witness stand to dramatize allegations in court documents that the defendants “kidnapped, raped, and beat women to gain control of them.” Authorities have decided to withhold their names until they testify. The defense will try to convince the jury that the women stole into America and sold their bodies by choice. Once picked up on immigration violations, they concocted tales of coercion in a bid to win residency, said Telesforo Del Valle Jr., the attorney for Josue Flores Carreto.

– Associated Press