What did we get after the NYPD flooded the subway system with a thousand more cops last year, to the tune of an additional $155 million in overtime spending? Not much more than a sharp increase in fare evasion enforcement and a shift in vibes. Assaults on the MTA system actually went up in the midst of this surge in cops, but nevermind that pesky detail. "Stopping fare evaders sets the tone of law and order," asserted the NYPD's Chief of Transit Michael Kemper at the end of 2023.
Now, a few months into 2024 and on the heels of an attack on a subway conductor (that possibly led to a wildcat strike), Mayor Eric Adams and Kemper are once again planning to address the eternal issue of subway crime with—surprise!—more cops and now, more bag checks, which Adams has promised will be "random." According to Kemper, 1,000 additional cops already began patrolling the subways in February. "When I'm on the subway system and I'm speaking to riders, they say, 'Eric, nothing makes us feel safer than seeing that officer at the token booth, walking through the system, walking through the trains,'" Adams said on Tuesday. Governor Kathy Hochul apparently agrees—later today, she's expected to announce that state troopers will be deployed underground.
In an interview with NY1 on Wednesday morning, Adams and Kemper defended the need to turn the subways into a police fortress. "We don't have a surge in crime, we have a surge in recidivism," Adams said, clutching a poster that he said he created, which included the statistic that 38 people arrested for assaulting MTA employees in 2023 had a total of 1,126 arrests.
Kemper put the blame for subway crime on, as he put it to NY1, "lawmakers, judges, and prosecutors." "Our cops are out there, they're working hard, and they're making arrests at record levels, they're stopping people with these quality of life offenses," he said, referring to fare evasion summonses. "The bigger question, or the better question, is what're happening to these arrests once they're made. Why are we forced to arrest people 50 times, a hundred times?" he said, before pointing the finger at "other stakeholders."
In an interview with PIX11 that followed, Adams seemed to agree with Kemper. "We need to do an analysis of the entire criminal justice system to make sure every aspect of it is doing its job," the mayor said.
And some links:
- Eric Adams and his top aides are continuing to maintain the feds are lying when it comes to delays in releasing promised (and paltry) funds to help with migrant costs. Via the Daily News: "According to Biden administration officials, FEMA dispatched a team to New York last week to help Adams' office with resolving aid application snags. However, Ingrid Lewis-Martin, Adams' chief adviser, claimed it's 'not true' a FEMA team came to New York when asked about the matter during Tuesday’s briefing. 'Why don’t they come and say, 'Listen, this is what you need to provide,'' Lewis-Martin said. 'If we give people paperwork to fill out and they cannot get it done, please assist them.'"
- Bob Menendez and his wife Nadine are in even more trouble, somehow.
- And Wegmans might be in a little bit of legal trouble too.
- Curtis Sliwa, too.
- "There's a large-scale migration going on in the Chinese community that’s completely off the radar screen."
- Only losers here.
- "NYPD officer suspended over bodycam video showing him kicking driver who allegedly rammed 'full speed' into fellow cop"
- A few landlords are moving to kick out illicit weed shops from their buildings, after threats from the City.
- It's not because of their very good food court.
- Gowanus residents are very worried that people staying at a proposed new migrant shelter might hang out in the nearby Whole Foods.
- In a bit of better news, the City has helped almost 40,000 migrants apply for asylum and work authorization.
- "Donald Trump falsely claims migrants are displacing NYC students. The city has empty seats."
