Transit Workers Union Local 100 has filed a lawsuit against the MTA over policy changes that no longer require sick or vacationing booth agents to be replaced.<\/p>\n
Union President John Chiarello says the change creates gaps in coverage and affects disabled riders.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo therefore, you have nobody in that area. So they’ll tell you, well, there’s another person on the other side of the station, but if you’re a person in a wheelchair that came on the brand new elevator provided and you come down and you can\u2019t find them, you\u2019re not going to know there\u2019s another person on the other side of the station, because that\u2019s not the way it works,\u201d Chiarello said.<\/p>\n
News 12 has previously reported incidents where riders became stuck in gates, and transit workers are able to release gates in emergencies. Chiarello says a lack of full staffing can lead to safety issues.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not just about customer service, it\u2019s about customer safety \u2014 and transit took the service out of customer service,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
New York City Transit President Demetrius Crichlow sent News 12 a statement saying, \u201cThe MTA and union agreed three years ago to new rules where station agents moved outside booths to better assist not only persons with disabilities but all New Yorkers at fare gates, payment machines and throughout the entire station. At the time of that signed agreement, public notice was provided, hearings were held, and station agents were provided additional pay.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chiarello says the agreement is not being honored.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt says it. They\u2019re supposed to be out of the booth working there. Where does it say the elimination of them? It doesn\u2019t,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Rider Marquell Archer told News 12 that station agents are also essential for people unfamiliar with the subway system.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know, a lot of riders are foreign. So a lot of people wouldn\u2019t really know where they\u2019re going, what they\u2019re doing. And if you don\u2019t fill those positions, you don\u2019t know. And it makes it harder for everyone else to go,\u201d Archer said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Transit Workers Union Local 100 has filed a lawsuit against the MTA over policy changes that no longer…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":168918,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[98,100,99,141,9,24,63,615,69248],"class_list":["post-168917","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn","tag-brooklyn-headlines","tag-brooklyn-news","tag-mta","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-subway","tag-token-booth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168917","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=168917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/168917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/168918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=168917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=168917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=168917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}