In their book, From Rocky to Pataki: Character and Caricatures in New York Politics (1998), Hy Rosen and Peter Slocum write that the so-called Bear Mountain Compact dictated that anything that went on north of Bear Mountain wasn't ever discussed back home in New York City. In The New York Times, however, Al Baker associates the Bear Mountain Compact with the Bear Mountain Bridge, writing, For years, the joke has been that the mostly male lawmakers and their hangers-on have clung to a secret code known as the Bear Mountain compact, whereby any liaisons with interns or young staff members that occur north of Bear Mountain Bridge, which spans the Hudson River between Orange and Westchester Counties, are not spoken about in the home districts in New York City or elsewhere.