NY Gov. Hochul vows $77M in overtime to put more police in subway system

The state will pay to put roughly a thousand more NYPD officers in the transit system for at least the next six months, Gov. Kathy Hochul said on Thursday.

That will include 300 previously announced officers deployed on every overnight train and an additional 750 on stations and platforms, Hochul said.

The governor first announced the overnight patrols earlier this week in her state of the state address. Those plus the additional overtime for 750 more police officers will cost $77 million for the first three months, she said Thursday.

Hochul initially said the state would pay for the overtime, and that she would ask lawmakers for an additional $77 million in the new budget. However late Thursday she clarified that the state and city will each pay $77 million for the additional officers.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams announced a similar surge last week that would put 200 more police officers on trains and platforms. The governor’s office didn’t clarify how the two plans will overlap.

“It’s called overtime,” she said during a press conference Thursday at the entrance to the subway at Grand Central station. “People want to see more people on the subways.”

An NYPD spokesperson said the department will deploy two-officer teams in phases. The first hundred officers will be on trains by Monday. The rest will be trained by the end of the month, the spokesperson said.

The new overtime funding is in addition to the current deployment of National Guard, state police band the NYPD’s usual deployment, Hochul said. She also touted other investments made using state funds, including more cameras, better lighting and barriers for people to stand behind as trains enter the station.

Since the pandemic, both the state and the city have added police to the subway system several times in an effort to make people safer and calm their fears of violence. They include a 2022 three-month surge of some 1,500 police officers, a 2024 deployment of 750 National Guard and state police which continues today and another 2024 addition of 800 plain clothes and uniformed officers to crack down on fare evasion.

Even though these initiatives have reduced crime, Hochul said statistics matter less than how people feel.

“An increase in  some felony assaults and some murders really shakes that foundation of security that everyone deserves to have,” she said.

Correction: Due to incorrect information supplied by the governor, this story has been updated to reflect that the state and city will each pay $77 million for the additional officers.