FULL OF HOT AIR?
HOV 'schemer': What, he's just good company
Surely, he can’t be serious. An MTA manager claims an inflatable doll that’s been riding shotgun in his Kia Telluride is there “for the company” — and not to skirt HOV restrictions, as his co-workers suspect.
Giulio Divirgilio, a general superintendent at the MTA buses department, pulled into his Brooklyn office building’s garage early Wednesday morning with the blown-up dummy plopped in the front seat like “Otto Pilot” in the 1980 comedy “Airplane!”
Confronted by The Post outside the East New York building, Divirgilio denied he had the inflatable suit-sporting businessman in tow to illegally cruise in lanes reserved for high-occupancy vehicles.
“I don’t use it for the HOV,” the $122,000-per-year government official insisted.
“I use it for the company.”
Pressed whether the dummy’s express purpose was, in fact, to cheat the HOV, Divirgilio replied: “Have I ever lied to you?”
The answer is likely yes, according to his co-workers.
“It was weird when we saw that thing [in his car] in the morning. Why would anyone have that there except to do HOV stuff?” said one employee who requested anonymity.
One union official said, “It’s unbecoming of a manager. We laugh, but what else is he doing in secret that we don’t know about?”
Divirgilio is a former NYPD cop who has been at the MTA for more than a decade, sources said.
He has two parking violations so far this year, according to city records, from January and March, both for driving without a front plate. The front plate was not there on Wednesday.
Inflatable dolls and other dummies are a common trick for scofflaws who want to skirt HOV rules.
A product resembling Divirgilio’s, called “Carpool Kenny,” is available online for $15.79 — although The Wall Street Journal reported in 2019 that cops have tried to crack down on the widespread passenger-dummy scheme.
Two people were caught pulling a similar stunt with mannequins in their cars in New York in 2019, one in Brooklyn and another on Long Island. The two men were both pulled over by cops who suspected funny business after spotting the phony passengers through the windshield.
Both men allegedly attempted to disguise their mannequins, using a baseball cap and hoodie.
The MTA said it is investigating Divirgilio’s plastic pal.