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'Citywide Operation Safe Muni' undercover agent in action.
SFist brought you this news yesterday, but somewhere around "100 police officers, Muni inspectors and sheriff's officials were involved in Citywide Operation Safe Muni," conducted between 1 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. on Wednesday. CBS 5 reports that citations were issued for fare evasion, not having a pass or transfer, and eating/drinking on public transit.
According to Sgt. Lyn Tomioka, "Six people were arrested on felony warrants and three others were arrested before being cited and released."
This sweep was the first of its kind in San Francisco. This comes on the heels of this year's study that concluded one out of every 10 passengers doesn't pay their fair share.
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Awesome! 900 tickets divided by 100 cops = 9 tickets per cop. At $75 per ticket (is that the going rate?) that's $675 per cop. I think we at least broke even on what we paid those cops for a days work.
i wouldn't be surprised if the operation was elective, thus sucking in tons of triple-and-a-half overtime from off-duties who "volunteered" to participate.
Good point. And now I see it's 400 tickets. Oh well. It sounds like this didn't do more than grab a handful of people with warrents and put some fear into the hearts of fare jumpers who hear about all this.
Actually, you need to factor in the revenue that was generated from people who made a point of paying, knowing that they might get busted & fined.
Seriously-- and those felons they arrested are going to COST us money in prison! This whole thing is a failure.
Our cops need to be more like Boba Fett: a certain acceptable amount of wookiee scalps by the time the two suns go down or don't bring your armored ass back to the Death Star.
The fines assessed are not the bounty the cops live off of. To try and suggest so is being as foolish as David Chiu. The point of the fines is to punish people so in the future, they don't steal from all of us. the long term benefit of that would be good for Muni.
I realize that in San Francisco, the crybaby left in town will decry the rights of criminals to steal from Muni (i.e. all of us who own it, the residents of SF) but whatever. Good for the SFPD. Nice to see this concept of "actually enforcing the law" being tried out.
agreed, and like xenu said, the real benefit will be seen when this is done w/ some regularity - such that it will force people to think twice about stealing muni rides.
however, the farebox is not supposed to pay for Muni, it will continue to be subsidized just like every other form of transportation.
true. all forms of transportation are subsidized in some way. car travel is the most subsidized. highways and roads get way more money than transit ever ever will.
there is at present no system that gets 100% revenue from the farebox, but if Muni had simply collected more of what it was already owed, there'd have been no fare increase this time around. Same goes for existing meters. it is like refusing to collect 20-30% of your paycheck, then wondering why you can't pay bills.
the flip side is that Muni also had a lot of its money illegally taken away (as per the courts). Which is like someone mugging you on every payday, taking away a good portion of your money, and then saying to you "why are you short of money?"
Well Greg, it's a good thing that these fines aren't paying the cops' salaries. 400 tickets is a tiny fraction (less than 2%) of the riders on just one MUNI line (I'm taking the L for instance - 30,000 daily riders). Less than 0.25% of the metro + F-line riders. Wanna guess what that fraction is systemwide? That's a very, very expensive haul.
http://www.sfmta.com/cms/rtep/tepdataindx.htm
Look, if you want people to pay fares, you need continuing, random enforcement. You can't just do a blowout one or two days a month. If you get SFPD riding the buses and trains on a daily basis, perhaps it'll even take a bite out of the crime onboard.
Let me put those numbers into use:
For every two LRVs, one fare evader was caught. One person. That's it. Actually, it's worse than that because that assumes 400 tickets on the metro only.
So because this wasnt efficient enough, we shouldnt enforce it at all?
I so agree with Greg. It's about time! Good for them.
Book 'em, Danno...
According to CBS, there were "more than 400" citations issues yesterday, not 900.
Everyone should know that if they got a citation, they can probably very easily contest it. Just fill out the form on the back with some excuse, mail it in, and within like 48 hours they mail you back a pink form that lets you off.
Good luck with all that....
I've never tried to freeload off my other citizens by contesting a citation for nonpayment of muni fare like wisitor seems to think is ok to do, but I'm pretty sure NOTHING in the city bureaucracy gets turned around "within like 48 hours."
I also agree wholeheartedly with Greg, except that I'm pretty left myself and I'm not crying for any of these moochers!
I am actually a lefty in some ways. I shoulda written that better to apply to a very small loud subset that is of the sort that loves to pretend to be for "oppressed people" and yet buys all their clothes made from sweatshop labor and think criminals are cool.
This police chief is slowly winning me over.
I appreciate this as someone who rides Muni.
The problem with this is that doing a "crackdown" results in a very temporary, localized crime reduction. The police need to do this consistently or there's no long-term benefit.
Agreed.
unfortunately, it's only designed to target blacks and poor, since no one will admit it.When sfpd brings in another police entity it's only purpose is to disguise the civil rights violation at hand. Maybe if it was to keep muni safe it would go over better, but such a show of force for fare jumpers is a compete waste of time and money. REALLY, SHERIFFS, come on people, i know everyone hates scofflaws, but whats next, using them for parking tickets.
i think it's mostly designed to target fare evaders.
and what about asians? or latinos? why were they left out of your comment? won't someone please think about the asians!?
i said blacks and POOR, and i would bet 100% of those ticketed were one or the other.YOU JACKASSES don't want to believe police use this for this pupose, you think just because people ars caught it justfies the mean.
go look at the list of the ethnicities that were ticketed and you'll all learn somthing.
So when blacks and poor folks are caught stealing at Safeway, you say let 'em go?
I fail to see how stealing goods and stealing services is any different.
you know i thought this was an intelligent message board, but i see that when YOUR sense of people's views don't mince with how everyone fells they don't deserve to join in, in case you've forgottten "fuckbomb" it's called free speech, i don't see anyone kicking you off for your handle, but anyway, I can see the point is clearly missed on what i pecieved as a way of EXPRESSING MY PECEPTION of what transpired, jeez what a bunch hypocrites
OOOH THE FLOUNCY FLOUNCY!
Toll, hun, not every law enforcement action is a racist plot or some sort of rights violation. Really. Sometimes these people are just ordinary folks trying to enforce law & order.
Ive been busted for fare evasion myself (though not this time), and im an unassuming looking white, male, late 20s creative/tech worker. (OH GOD MY SECRET IS OUT SOMEONE HELP ME) Id missed the window for muni passes, and didnt have the right change for a fare from duboce park to monty station, and was too lazy to walk down market.
Also, just to be clear - free speech means youre free to say what you believe, but it doesnt shield you from the reactions of others to that speech. These boards are participatory. Assume anything you say is going to be discussed, possibly disagreed with and challenged. Your right to say something is equal to my right to call you out for being an idiot for saying it. ^_^
Wait a second...you mean that black people are NOT allowed to ride the bus for free? Learn something new...
Pull the plug on Toliveinsf, he/she is braindead.
But on a more serious note, there are plenty of people who hop onto MUNI illegally, then take out their ipod/phone whatever, so to say this is targeting blacks and poor people is a bullshit cop-out.
I heard this sting was designed to target fare evasion. If it is mostly blacks and poor, then doesn't this class just walk? The city is 7x7, and the Muni doesn't have a printing press like Obama.
Muni: Now 90% slower than walking.
spot on!
if you don't have 2.00, stay the fuck off of muni and walk.
where the fuck are you going when you don't have 2.00 to your name?
stay home!
MUNI, you will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dRd_vZT6zPY
What they are doing is similar to the story in the Tipping Point by Malcom Gladwell. Basically it talked about how they did this same thing on New York subways and they caught a good amount of Felons. Should check it out.
i'm glad SOMEONE gets it, doesnt matter what color, what they do has nothing to do with what they're doing
EEEckkkkkk!!!!!!
Cops on Muni to.
It was bad enough with the teens and gangbangers and kung-fu fighting woman.
Now cops as well.
Thank Goodness I ride a bicycle.