City Funds Policing of Buses in Crime Areas
The Los Angeles City Council approved the financing of a pilot program Wednesday to beef up security on Southern California Rapid Transit District buses that travel through the city’s high-crime areas.
The unanimous vote freed up $421,000 from a city fund earmarked for transportation matters to finance a one-year program in which transit police will either ride on or follow designated buses. The program is similar to one approved last year by the County Board of Supervisors for an unincorporated section of South Los Angeles.
The program calls for seven transit police officers to be used where needed based on crime statistics compiled by police and the RTD.
In 1989, there were four murders, 87 assaults and 300 incidents of burglary and robbery on public buses in the city, most of which were centered in south and southwest sections of the city, police records show.
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