Hack kills self at City Hall, says pols ruined biz

DRIVEN BY DISGUST for politicians he blamed for destroying his livelihood, a for-hire car driver shot and killed himself Monday at the gates of City Hall.

Doug Schifter, 61, posted a suicide note on Facebook before killing himself at 7:10 a.m., recounting the car industry’s woes — which he laid at the feet of Mayor de Blasio, Gov. Cuomo and former Mayor Michael Bloomberg.

“Bloomberg, de Blasio and Andrew Cuomo have each had their part in destroying a once thriving industry,” wrote Schifter.

“They count their money and we are driven down into the streets we drive becoming homeless and hungry. I will not be a slave working for chump change. I would rather be dead.”

He shot himself in the face with a shotgun while sitting in a rented black sedan. He died at the east gate of City Hall, which is the mayor’s entrance.

De Blasio was en route to Albany at the time.

Schifter lived in the tiny Poconos town of Thornhurst Township, Pa., which has a population of 1,085.

In a lengthy Facebook manifesto, he wrote that he was in poor physical condition and did not have health insurance.

He called Uber a “liar, cheat and thief” and said it and other e-hail companies contributed to the downfall of the for-hire car industry. He said he’d logged nearly 5 million miles on the road.

“I worked 100-120 consecutive hours almost every week for the past fourteen plus years. When the industry started in 1981, I averaged 40-50 hours. I cannot survive any longer with working 120 hours! I am not a Slave and I refuse to be one,” wrote Schifter, who owned his car.

“I hope with the public sacrifice I make now that some attention to the plight of the drivers and the people will be done to save them and it will have not have been in vain.”

A bankruptcy filing from 2005 indicates that Schifter’s financial troubles preceded the disruptive effect of apps like Uber on the forhire industry.

That year, the driver owed $203,000 to creditors, but had just $146,000 in assets.

He averaged $8,162 in monthly income, but racked up $6,278 in expenses associated with his for-hire work. That left him with only $1,884, bankruptcy papers show.

“Killing himself here at this doorstep sends a very clear message to lawmakers, to the authorities that govern this industry: Changes have to be made,” said Fernando Mateo, spokesman for the New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers. “A lot of these drivers are fed up.” Noureddine Afsi, a black-car driver who stopped by City Hall after the suicide, understood Schifter’s anger. He said drivers have to work 18 hours per day, six days a week.

“You deal with the traffic, you deal with the cops, you deal with the passengers, and the prices are going up, and we’re starving,” Afsi, 51, said.

De Blasio called the suicide a “horrible tragedy” during an appearance on NY1’s “Inside City Hall.” The mayor famously failed in his first term to put a cap on the proliferation of cars taking trips with Uber and other apps.

“We’ve been trying since then to find other ways of creating fairness and balance in the industry. There’s more work to do, for sure, on that

front,” he said.

Schifter was well-known to others who closely follow the ailing industry.

Neil Weiss, 51, owner of Black Car News, said the driver had written columns for his website for years.

“I’m just very shaken up by it. He was a good man who was struggling,” Weiss said.

Ira Goldstein, chief executive of The Black Car Fund, a for-hire industry workers compensation group, also knew Schifter. He “took his career very seriously and was very distraught with the direction the industry’s going. Obviously, he didn’t agree with a lot of the policies that were put in place, or not put in place, by the city or the state,” Goldstein said.

Colleagues said they didn’t believe he had children. Efforts to reach relatives were unsuccessful.

The proliferation of app-based car services have flooded the taxi market with drivers, who are all in competition for the same pool of passengers.

By the end of 2016, the number of cars affiliated with app companies’ bases reached 48,000 vehicles, up from 18,000 vehicles in June 2015, according to one analysis.

Goldstein said Schifter often spoke of the changing business. “He felt it was impossible to be able to make a living.”