Given that subway safety concerns could impair New York City’s economic recovery from COVID-19, recent spikes in crime and levels of policing triggered spirited discussion at Wednesday’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority meeting.
As often as been the case, the matter has featured bickering between the state-run MTA and City Hall, just as the city is reopening en masse from the pandemic and subway riders are returning.
“It’s mind-boggling that, aside from an apparent informal briefing to a sole board member, the city had not provided the MTA with detailed information related to the deployment of its police officers throughout the subway system until pressed on Wednesday at the authority's May 2021 board meeting,” MTA Inspector General Carolyn Pokorny said.
At the meeting, New York Police Department Transit Bureau Chief Kathleen O’Reilly said that 2,663 NYPD officers patrol the subway system any given day, more than previously reported.
An MTA survey of 33,000 riders showed that about 75% of respondents considered crime and harassment “extremely important.” Additionally, an Emerson College poll released Tuesday said that crime was the top issue for voters in the upcoming mayoral primary.
MTA Chairman Patrick Foye called the authority’s May 17 return to 24-hour service “no better indicator of our region’s return to recovery.” The state-run MTA operates the city’s subway-and-bus network, two commuter rail lines and several bridges and tunnels.
Foye, while acknowledging Mayor Bill de Blasio’s recent deployment of extra police officers in the subways, asked for further help. “This is not politics,” he said. “It’s reality for our customers and employees.”
While the MTA has its own officers, the New York Police Department also has a transit division under a 1995 merger.
The MTA is one of the largest municipal issuers with $50 billion in debt, including special credits.
Next week, it intends to price roughly $200 million of bond anticipation notes to fund the initial infrastructure for congestion pricing for Manhattan, formally called the central business district tolling program.
The offering memorandum for the Triborough Bridge and Tunnel Authority’s Series 2021A second subordinate notes will go out later this week, finance manager Patrick McCoy said Wednesday. The BANs are secured by a third lien on net revenues of the TBTA, also known as MTA Bridges and Tunnels.
According to data on the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board's EMMA website, a block of Series 2012E transportation revenue bonds maturing in 2032 that originally priced at 97.857 cents on the dollar and a 3.5% coupon, sold to a customer Wednesday at a price of 103.15 cents.
Board member Larry Schwartz called for possibly bringing in a former city police commissioner such as Bill Bratton or Raymond Kelly to advise on crime containment, “someone of that magnitude that has run the NYPD and understands the subway system here.
“We spend money on consultants all the time.”
Asked about his suggestion at the post-meeting press conference, Foye said: “It’s something that ought to be considered, for sure.”
As the city emerges from coronavirus-related lockdowns, MTA ridership is up across the board. On Friday, more than 2.3 million New Yorkers rode the subways alone.
“It’s not a be-all and end-all … but it is sort of an indication of people moving around in this city,” Amy Laskey, a managing director at Fitch Ratings, said on a webcast hosted by Northeast Women in Public Finance.
Financial concerns still hover, according to the watchdog Citizens Budget Commission.
“The COVID-19 pandemic and consequent recession have severely worsened the [MTA’s] financial outlook,” CBC senior research associate Alex Armlovich said in a
The pandemic, he said, will probably cost the authority as much as $25 billion in related spending over the 2020-2024 period and lower revenues from fares, tolls, dedicated taxes and subsidies.
Improvements, Armlovich said, are necessary in operation and maintenance productivity improvement; bus speed increases; one-person train operation on subways with fare-payment modernization on commuter rail; and healthcare savings.
Proof-of-payment, said CBC, could mean a roughly 50% reduction in Long Island Rail Road conductors.
Foye said MTA officials are looking at the CBC’s report.
“Some of the things they suggest can easily be implemented,” he said. “Others are more difficult because they require changes in law or regulation, collective bargaining agreements. We’re looking at the latest CBC report to see what is actionable in the practical world we live in.”
The MTA’s “persistent financial instability” could pressure the city, said Ronnie Lowenstein, president of the watchdog Independent Budget Office. Budget-wise, she likened the MTA and the New York City Housing Authority.
“While neither are directly city agencies, they are both critical to the city and pressure could build for additional city subsidies,” she said at a City Council finance committee meeting.
