Subway Safety Plan

THE
SUBWAY SAFETY PLAN

Our city is just starting to come back from the pandemic. Progress cannot be derailed by
crime and New Yorkers living in fear of being slashed, roundhouse punched, or robbed on
their way to work or on their way home. Real concerns about subway safety are making
too many New Yorkers hesitant to return to mass transit. Sustained declines in ridership
will crush struggling small businesses, reduce investment in our city, and harm tourism —
all of which will ultimately hit working-class New Yorkers hardest. I have said it time and
time again: Public safety is the prerequisite to prosperity.
We are continually seeing violent attacks in our subways, threatening the lives and
well-being of New Yorkers as well as our recovery. To halt this surge in subway crime in its
tracks, we don’t just need more officers assigned to high-traffic areas — we also need
better force deployment to create a more visible police presence and cover more area
across the system. My “Safe Subways” subway redeployment plan will better use existing
units to more effectively address this crime crisis. Additionally, we must immediately
increase the number of City mental health beds and workers to effectively and swiftly
address this crime problem, make New Yorkers feel safe again, and create a welcoming
city that will attract visitors and new investment. Tackling this problem requires both
intervention of existing threats and prevention of future harm, and this city must be
committed to both. We can and must deliver safer conditions on our subway trains and
platforms while providing the compassionate short-term and long-term care for those
suffering from mental health crises, who often are both the perpetrators and victims of
subway crime.
ERIC ADAMS 2021

INTERVENTION
• Redeployment of some officers in the anti-terror, K-9, and metro fraud units to patrols,
as well as of officers in administrative roles at NYPD Transit headquarters, whose jobs
there can be done by civilians;
• More active oversight of units that could have a more significant presence, such as the
midnight train unit that is meant to focus on sleeping and intoxicated passengers;
• Capital investment in improved cell service and Wi-Fi, as well as upgraded cameras at
every station;
• Real-time 24-hour video surveillance monitoring of all high-crime stations;
• Re-funding of the transit homeless outreach unit;
• Strengthened use of Kendra’s Law — a State law that grants judges authority to issue
orders for court-ordered assisted outpatient treatment to individuals with serious
mental health issues — and work with Albany lawmakers on reforms to justly expand how
it can be applied, including greater clarity on conditions and conduct that demonstrate a
person is a danger to themselves;
• Partnered teams of trained mental health professionals with existing police patrolsof the
subway system, conducting routine inspections and engaging with people struggling
with mental health crises with a focus on the city’s most highly-trafficked stations;
PREVENTION
• Increase of inpatient psychiatric beds, working to repeal the Medicaid exclusion that
effectively prohibits billing from specialized psychiatric hospitals as well as halting the
State’s decertification of existing beds;
• Creation of more medical respite beds, provided by crisis stabilization centers that offer
short-term care for unhoused New Yorkers who are not sick enough to stay in the
hospital, but are too sick to return to a shelter or the streets;
• Expansion of psychosocial rehab services, known popularly as the “clubhouse model”

that combines a physical community center environment with access to social services
that holistically address the housing, employment, education, social, and health needs
of members.
• Expediting the construction of supportive housing units, moving up by five years the
timeline of the City’s 15/15 Supportive Housing Initiative, which currently aims to create
15,000 units of supportive housing in 15 years.

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THE

SUBWAY SAFETY PLAN

ERIC ADAMS 2021

• Real-time 24-hour video surveillance monitoring of all high-crime stations;

• Re-funding of the transit homeless outreach unit;

• Expansion of psychosocial rehab services, known popularly as the “clubhouse model”

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