56,000,000

NY Post 

It’s highway robbery — and the MTA doesn’t even know the culprit.

The authority is down at least $56 million thanks to “unbillable” tolls for which officials cannot find an address to mail the bill, State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli said Thursday.

MTA Bridges and Tunnels was unable to send bills for six million crossings through from September 2019 to June 2021 — leaving millions of dollars uncollected, the comptroller’s office said in a letter to the MTA following up on three-year-old audit into its cashless tolling.

A huge chunk of the lost revenue — $33.9 million — stemmed from the MTA and its vendors not having agreements with other states’ DMVs to access vehicle registration information, particularly for temporary plates.

Another $21.8 million went uncollected because license plates were either too dark, too bright, missing a state name — or just missing altogether. Thousands of transactions worth another $2.9 million went unbilled due to bad image quality.

Ex-Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced plans to remove tollbooths at the MTA’s seven bridges and two tunnels in late 2016. The program got underway a few months later.

The system’s flaws have come into sharp focus in recent months. In September, the MTA Inspector General flagged a transit employee who bragged to co-workers about eluding tolls with an obscured license plate and owed $100,000 in tolls and fines.

Get ready to be pissed on more

From the NY Post:

In January, the City Council voted to reclassify low-level crimes such as public urination, public consumption of alcohol, littering, subway fare evasion and taking up multiple seats on the subway from criminal to civil offenses.

But if California is any indication, it may not have been a smart move.

Retail giants with locations in the Golden State, including Safeway, Target, Rite Aid and CVS pharmacies, say they have seen at least a 15 percent increase in shoplifting since California voters opted to reduce theft penalties in 2014, The Associated Press reports. Shoplifting reports in LA increased 25 percent in the year after Proposition 47 passed.

Should the NYPD dump "Broken Windows"?

From Huffington Post:

As outrage simmered in the hours before the release of the Ferguson verdict, NYPD Commissioner William Bratton made a rare public appearance to defend his Broken Windows policing philosophy. But his remarks brought controversy from those affected by aggressive policing.

"No conversation on urban crime is complete without the communities that are affected by [Bratton's] policing theory," said activist and Huffington Post contributor Josmar Trujillo, dressed in a snapback and "Fire Bratton Now" t-shirt on the sidewalk outside the event.

During Bratton's remarks, Trujillo and at least a dozen other activists stood to protest the abuse they say Bratton's policing has brought to targeted communities in New York City.

The appearance was Bratton's attempt to shore up Broken Windows policing against a rising tide of discontent. But the best he could muster was a skin-deep redefinition of the theory, even as he failed to respond to loud concerns from his constituents.

Speaking in NYU's opulent Vanderbilt Hall, Bratton celebrated the crime reductions of his previous NYPD tenure. But he glossed over the reality that nearly every American city experienced a decline over the same period - even without locking away historic numbers of residents.

And he ignored the topic of police reform, highlighted by the recent shooting death of Akai Gurley, until questioned by NYU Professor Rachel Barkow. Asked what measures could reduce wrongful deaths, he was reticent to promise swift reform, citing high costs for proposed body cameras and logistical delay in pairing rookies with experienced officers.

But most troubling was his disingenuous attempt to redefine Broken Windows, which is conventionally understood as aggressive enforcement of quality-of-life laws like "panhandling [and] disorderly behavior."

Bratton claimed that the meteoric growth in low-level arrests is actually driven by policing of serious crimes - he cited drunk driving and domestic violence as examples - rather than by arrests for sidewalk grilling and moving between train cars.

But that claim does not mesh with the facts - arrests for quality-of-life offenses have surged faster than any other crime.

Turnstile-hopping, considered by many police reform advocates to epitomize Broken Windows policing, accounts for more jail convictions than any other charge (excluding all drug possession charges combined). From Bratton's speech, the audience would not have known that between 2008 and 2013, turnstile arrests grew by 69%.

Paying is for suckers

NYCUrbanScape on Flickr

From [to the turnstile bandits at the elmhurst avenue M/R stop] by Matthew Kremer:

he descends the stairs of the M/R line
and pauses for a minute
to survey the scene.
waits cautiously,
listening for the approach
of the eight-car manhattan train.
looks at all the gum splotches
beneath his rotting soles.
what was that noise? a radio?
over the course of three days--one
each in january, february and march--
clerks noted a whopping 329
fare-beaters at the station.
he makes a dash for it
like a wigged-out gazelle
over the turnstiles
down the stairs
and into the car.
a few stragglers see it
and shake their heads.
a photo of victoria saravia
flutters at the edge of the wall
in the gust of the departure.

MTA loses millions due to bus farebeating

From the Daily News:

THE MTA LOSES about $50 million in revenue each year to bus farebeaters — more than triple what it previously estimated, the Daily News has learned.

The staggering figure is partly the result of a new way the authority calculates fare-dodging, but also indicates that the longstanding problem has worsened because of lax enforcement, sources said.

The authority previously had estimated that bus farebeaters were stealing $14 million worth of free rides annually.

Gauging bus freeloading levels has been an inexact science. Drivers are supposed to keep tallies by pushing a button every time someone boards without paying. The authority also has used video to estimate the frequency of bus farebeating.

Council Member says fare-beating not a big deal

From the Daily News:

There's a time and a place for everything — even farebeating, in one City Councilman’s opinion.

Councilman Robert Jackson said he told his wife to duck under the turnstiles at the 181st St. station on the A line, which had a broken MetroCard machine, rather than walk to a staffed entrance at 184th St.

“I told her to go under,” Jackson said. “I would have gone under.

“Whoever goes to buy a MetroCard should be entitled to a free ride if the machines aren’t working, if there’s no token booth clerk there,” he added.

The MTA swiped back.

“Farebeating is a crime,” MTA spokesman Adam Lisberg said. “It’s wrong. It’s illegal, and it deprives the MTA of the money it needs to carry you on the subway.”

Kids think turnstile jumping is ok

From the Daily News:

Alicia is among some 500,000 students who get a free student MetroCard from school, but she still hops the turnstile when she can get away with it, she admitted, as she stepped onto an F train at Seventh Ave. and Ninth St.

"To save the fare," she said with disdain for having to explain the obvious. Student MetroCards are programmed with three fares - or three trips - each weekday.

Theoretically, that allows one trip to school, one to an after-school activity and one final trip back home. Still, the amount of fare-beating jumps between 3p.m. and 4 p.m., when dismissal bells ring across the city - and students are to blame, MTA analysts have found.

Alicia gave the delinquents' rationale. There's more to life than school and three trips a day often are not enough. You might want to go downtown - as in downtown Brooklyn. Or go see a friend. Maybe a movie.

Each time you enter the subway without using your student MetroCard, you save one extra ride to take legally, and safely, later that day - especially if a cop happens to be near the entrance.

"The cops, the MTA, they're all going to get paid whether I pay or not, whether I hop or don't hop. I could put the money I save aside into a college fund or something."

Elmhurst Ave station worst in city for fare beating

From the Daily News:

Brazen fare-beaters skip turnstiles once every 10 minutes at one Queens subway station - right under the noses of token booth clerks.

More than 157 riders were spotted sneaking through an emergency exit into the subway system at the Elmhurst Ave. station on the Queens Blvd. line during a one-day survey in March.

The fare cheats made booth N325A tops in the entire city for fare-beating at a staffed subway entrance.

Over the course of three days - one each in January, February and March - clerks noted a whopping 329 fare-beaters at the station.

Some hustle through the gate after a friend who paid opens the gate from the inside.

Others saunter in after simply waiting for a passenger to exit improperly through the emergency gate.

An alarm sounds briefly each time the gate is opened.

The one-day transit survey captured only fare-beaters observed by token booth clerks, meaning dozens of others may have gone unnoticed.

Photo by Jim Henderson from Wikipedia