Metro Leaders Consider Changes to Safety Amid Recent Stabbings, Assaults

Following recent violent attacks tied to the region’s transit system, Metro’s Board of Directors Thursday will consider a motion seeking to bolster public safety on buses, rails and stations.

Los Angeles Mayor and Metro Board of Directors Chair Karen Bass had previously directed an immediate surge of law enforcement personnel across the transit system. She also said a motion would be introduced that would “increase the daily planned deployment of public safety personnel on Metro and direct public safety personnel to be physically present on buses and trains and proactively patrol areas as well.”

The motion will also call for establishment of a “unified command” of the various law enforcement agencies who police the system — including Metro security, the Los Angeles Police Department, Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and Long Beach Police Department.

It will also require that “cellular service is enabled and working in all underground Metro rail stations, on the platforms and during transit throughout the rail system,” Bass said. “The importance of this is so passengers, if they need to, get help immediately.”

Concerns about safety on the Metro system have escalated in response to the highly publicized crimes, despite statistics showing an overall drop in crime tied to buses and trains over the past year.

Metro officials have wrestled in recent years over the best way to police the transit system. Three years ago — in the post-George Floyd era of calls for reductions in law enforcement spending — Metro opted to vastly expand its use of “ambassadors,” who are essentially customer service representatives positioned across the transit system to provide support and information to riders and a resource for people to report maintenance or safety issues.

According to Metro’s own website, however, the ambassadors “are not security officers and do not replace existing security personnel or law enforcement. Rather, they are an added workforce that collaborates with other Metro departments in order to maintain public safety and help make the system feel safer for our riders.”

It was unclear how much the law enforcement increase being sought by the board members would cost the transit agency.

County Supervisor Lindsey Horvath, also a Metro board member, introduced a separate motion also aimed at boosting safety. Horvath had said the motion would call for a “cost analysis of all public safety entities that patrol the system to inform what visible presence is not only necessary, but most effective to make our system safer for everyone.”

Metro’s Board of Directors on April 29 approved an emergency procurement declaration to speed up acquisition and installation of protective barriers for drivers on about 2,000 buses due to the “sudden, unexpected increased severity of assaults on operators.”

The board also pushed for a review of other potential safety improvements, including an examination of measures such as securing all transit station entrances and exits, increasing security cameras on the system and making use of facial recognition technology.

Some bus drivers recently staged a “sick out” in protest of recent attacks on drivers.