Gov. Hochul’s plan to put police on every overnight subway train starts next week, she told reporters Thursday.
The plan, which Hochul first announced in her State of the State address earlier this week, is meant to bolster the visibility of law enforcement officers on city mass transit for the next six months
“People want to see police officers on the trains and in the stations,” she told reporters.
Starting Monday, two NYPD officers will walk each of the 150 subway trains that run overnight from 9 p.m. to 5 a.m.
The plan won’t be hiring any additional transit cops, however.
The governor’s gambit is to fund six months of overtime for more than 1,000 officers, including 300 additional tours of duty for overnight subway patrols and overtime for 750 officers in stations and on platforms. The total cost is expected to run $154 million.
The first three months of OT pay will be funded by $77 million out of the state’s general fund. An additional $77 million in funding for the extra patrols is expected in the spring budget.
According to the city’s Office of Management and Budget, there are currently 2,583 uniformed cops in the NYPD’s Transit Bureau.
“They’re not going anywhere,” Hochul said. “This is not taking people out who are already performing important protective services.”
Transit sources told the Daily News that they expect Hochul’s surge to involve some precinct cops from outside the Transit Bureau as well.
The surge comes on top of 1,000 National Guard soldiers deployed to the system by Hochul last year, plus at least 250 state police. Unlike state and local police, the National Guard has no authority to make arrests in the subway system.
Ten people were murdered in the New York City subway system last year — including the recent, random and gruesome immolation of a homeless New Jersey woman asleep on a Brooklyn train — up from five murders in 2023.
Burglaries, robberies and grand larcenies in the subway system dropped in 2024, while the number of felony and misdemeanor assaults remained steady.
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