An April report from the Empire Center for Public Policy highlighted a 16% surge last year in overtime costs at the MTA — where the $418 million payroll cost in 2018 was $82 million more than what the authority expects to take in from the last fare and toll increases. Read More
The agency’s overall payroll grew by a whopping $418 million in 2018, according to a report published last month by the watchdog group Empire Center for Public Policy. Some LIRR workers made more than $300,000 a year in overtime alone. Read More
Late last month, the Empire Center in Albany found that MTA overtime costs swelled by nearly 16% last year, or $418 million. Though every unit played a part, the Long Island Rail Road was worst by a country mile. OT there shot up 30%, to $224 million. Fifty-eight of the MTA’s 100 highest-paid employees, including the top four, worked at the LIRR. How much did some hourly employees earn, after all was said and done? $461,646, $395,397 and $380,407, driving up their pensions in the bargain. Read More
The Post began spotlighting these abuses, particularly at the LIRR, after the Empire Center reported that OT costs there spiked 30 percent last year — with some employees pulling down hundreds of thousands in extra-hours pay. Read More
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority has assigned its own police force to monitor attendance and overtime use by Long Island Railroad employees, the Daily News reports. Read More
The LIRR racked up $225 million in OT last year, according to the Empire Center — consuming nearly a third of the $740 million in fares Long Island commuters pay. Put another way, without this burden, the average commuter riding from Huntington to Penn Station every day could pay $253, not $363. Read More
Despite a year fraught with delayed, canceled and stalled trains, as well as the seventh fare hike in less than a decade, a new study released by Empire Center found that MTA’s overtime rose by nearly 16 percent last year. Read More
The number of LIRR employees who made more than $250,000 increased by nearly 50 percent from 2017 to 2018, according to payroll data found on the Empire Center for Public Policy's transparency website, SeeThroughNY.net. Read More