Support for police on NYC subways cuts across party and racial lines, poll says

Nearly three-quarters of New York state residents support Gov. Kathy Hochul’s plan to put two NYPD officers on every overnight subway train for the next six months, a new Siena College poll finds.

Support for the plan cut across party and racial lines and was especially favored by those living in the suburbs and older New Yorkers, according to the poll.

Hochul recently promised to fund the overtime required to assign 300 additional patrols to ride every subway train between the hours of 9 p.m. and 5 a.m. for the next six months. Her plan would use $77 million in state tax dollars, which would be matched by another $77 million in city funding. Hochul has signaled she will push to extend the funding in the future.

While major crime on the subway is rare for the MTA’s millions of daily commuters, a recent analysis found that serious assaults in transit more than tripled between 2009 and last year. Announcements of police “surges” into the transit system have been frequent in recent years and tend to follow high-profile crimes against riders.

Siena College pollster Steven Greenber said putting police into transit is a broadly popular political message.

“Normally you see Democrats one way, Republicans another way, but here there is essentially near universal support,” he said in a phone interview.

“ I think it's just that people feel vulnerable there [on the subway],” Greenberg said. “Whenever there's any bad incident on the train, it gets a lot of attention and I think people see that and it creates a visceral reaction.”

According to the Siena poll, 71% of New Yorkers polled supported Hochul’s plan of paying the overtime to add patrols to overnight trains. This includes 70% of Democrats and 74% of Republicans. The percentage of suburban residents outpaced those living in New York City with 80% of suburbanites saying they support the state paying for NYPD officers to ride the trains overnight compared to 71% of city dwellers.

Police on trains also polled well regardless of race, with approval from 76% of Black people, 71% of white people and 72% of Latinos. However, older New Yorkers much preferred the plan — with 81% approval among those over 55 years old — compared to only 59% approval among those between the ages of 18 and 34.

The issue of putting police on trains was more popular than another proposal to increase the number of reasons a person with mental illness can be involuntarily committed to a mental health facility. Only 51% of those polled agreed with that proposal.

However, Greenberg theorizes that involuntarily committing people with mental illness is more difficult to understand and notes that an equal number of Republicans and Democrats who were polled support the measure.