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A joint New York State budget hearing devolved into a shouting match when a Long Island Republican challenged the MTA’s Hochul-appointed chairman over a $35 million security deal, questioning why contracted guards appear to be letting fare evaders walk amid claims the agency is rife with waste.
State Sen. Mario Mattera, R-St. James, sharply questioned Janno Lieber over a $35 million contract for private security guards at subway stations as the transit authority grapples with rising fare evasion amid higher fares for paying straphangers.
Mattera previously spoke out in opposition to the major contract with Allied Security Services of Conshohocken, Pennsylvania, as the latest example of systemic waste from the transit agency’s coffers.
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Lieber initially objected to the line of questioning, saying that anyone working as a gate guard for Allied is a New Yorker.
“It’s not a bunch of Pennsylvanians,” he said.
Mattera pointed to reports in the New York Post and elsewhere saying guards are letting people essentially jump the turnstiles, including when riders have issues scanning in during the city’s post-Metro Card era.
“Why do we have people helping people avoid tolls? We have videos,” he said.
Lieber became similarly angry after Mattera spoke over him.
“Let me finish. Let me finish,” Lieber said.
“You’re rambling,” Mattera said. “Why do we have this?”
Lieber replied that Allied’s guards reduced fare evasion by more than one-third since the contract was signed, but the two kept shouting over each other before Lieber could be heard yelling, “Shut up.”
“Be quiet,” he said, before Mattera demanded — and received — an apology from the Hochul appointee.
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Committee Chairman J. Gary Pretlow, D-Mount Vernon, soon slammed his gavel and also yelled “shut up,” admonishing both men.
“Raising voices will not be tolerated,” Pretlow was quoted as saying by the South Shore Press amid the crosstalk.
One guard interviewed by the New York Post said a lot of people don’t want to pay their fare.
“They say, ‘You’re not a cop, you can’t stop it’,” Romuald Zampou told the paper.
One of New York City’s few Republicans in the state Senate, Steve Chan of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, said in a statement before the hearing that the guards are no better than “scarecrows.”
“Instead of paying outrageous salaries to people who stand around like scarecrows and do absolutely nothing to stop fare evasion, the MTA and the city must take the handcuffs off our police officers,” said Chan, a former cop.
“Let them issue summonses, make arrests and pressure district attorneys to prosecute fare evaders. We’ve done it before. We know it works.”
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State Sen. Bill Weber, R-Clarkstown, whose suburban commuters often rely on MTA heavy rail out of Suffern, Spring Valley and Tarrytown, said the security guard expenditure is just the latest transit boondoggle.
“It’s clear the MTA needs a full audit, and, now, so do its subcontractors,” Weber said in a statement.
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