MTA chairman Lieber, Sen. Mattera clash over $35M security contract

A joint listening to on the New York state price range descended right into a shouting match when a Lengthy Island Republican challenged the Hochul-appointed chairman of the MTA over a $35 million safety deal, questioning why contracted safety guards look like permitting tax evaders to roam amid claims that the company is riddled with waste.

State Sen. Mario Mattera, R-St. James pointedly questioned Janno Lieber over a $35 million contract for personal safety guards at subway stations because the transit authority grapples with rising fare evasion amid increased straphanger charges.

Mattera beforehand spoke out in opposition to the main contract with Conshohocken, Pennsylvania-based Allied Safety Providers, as the newest instance of systematic waste of the transportation company’s coffers.

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Lieber initially objected to the questioning, saying that anybody who works as a gatekeeper for Allied is a New Yorker.

“They don’t seem to be a bunch of Pennsylvanians,” he stated.

New York state price range listening to erupts into shouting match (State Meeting of New York)

Mattera pointed to studies within the New York Publish and elsewhere that safety guards basically let folks bounce the turnstiles, together with when passengers have bother scanning through the metropolis’s post-Metro Card period.

“Why do now we have folks serving to folks keep away from tolls? Now we have movies,” he stated.

Lieber equally turned indignant after Mattera spoke about him.

‘Let me end. Let me end,” Lieber stated.

“You are wandering,” Mattera stated. “Why do now we have this?”

Lieber responded that Allied safety guards had diminished tariff evasion by greater than a 3rd because the contract was signed, however the two continued to shout over one another earlier than Lieber might be heard shouting, “Shut up.”

“Be quiet,” he stated, earlier than Mattera demanded – and obtained – an apology from Hochul’s appointee.

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Law enforcement officials patrol the passageway connecting the New York Metropolis Port Authority bus terminal to the Occasions Sq. subway station, December 12, 2017. (AP Picture/Seth Wenig, file)

Committee Chairman J. Gary Pretlow, D-Mount Vernon, quickly banged his gavel and in addition shouted “shut up,” admonishing each males.

“Elevating voices is not going to be tolerated,” Pretlow stated South Coast Press amid the cross discuss.

A safety guard interviewed by the New York Publish stated many individuals do not wish to pay their fares.

“They are saying, ‘You are not a cop, you possibly can’t cease it,'” Romuald Zampou advised the newspaper.

Certainly one of New York Metropolis’s few Republicans within the Senate, Steve Chan of Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, stated in a press release earlier than the listening to that the guards aren’t any higher than “scarecrows.”

“As a substitute of paying exorbitant salaries to individuals who stand round like scarecrows and do completely nothing to cease tax evasion, the MTA and the town ought to take {the handcuffs} off our law enforcement officials,” stated Chan, a former cop.

“Allow them to challenge summonses, make arrests and stress prosecutors to prosecute fare dodgers. We have executed it earlier than. We all know it really works.’

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Zohran Mamdani, mayor of New York, left, and Janno Lieber, CEO of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority throughout a storm briefing on the New York Metropolis Emergency Administration Middle within the Brooklyn borough of New York on January 23, 2026. (Adam Grey/Bloomberg through Getty Photographs)

State Sen. Invoice Weber, R-Clarkstown, whose suburban commuters typically depend on MTA heavy rail from Suffern, Spring Valley and Tarrytown, stated the guard spending is simply the newest transportation drawback.

“It’s clear that the MTA wants a full audit, and now its subcontractors as nicely,” Weber stated in a press release.