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The MTA is suspending its EAGLE bus fare inspection teams for allegedly roughing up passengers in a series of disturbing incidents they failed to report on time — as the teams aren’t even succeeding in lowering fare evasion, officials said.
The move by transit boss Janno Lieber comes as fare skipping rose from 36% in 2022 to 48% in the first half of 2026, despite the presence of the teams.
It also comes a day after a $25 million suit was filed against the MTA by Kyle Taylor, a Brooklyn school dean who was roughed up by EAGLE inspectors over allegedly not paying the $3 fare in an incident caught on video earlier this month.
Lieber said that outburst of violence — which has been denounced by passenger advocate groups — was never reported to his office. He also said a similar harassment complaint against MTA fare inspectors over an encounter with a man aboard a Bronx bus was not sent up the chain of command.
“I was not happy that leadership of the MTA and even New York City Transit didn’t even hear about that episode until more than a week afterwards,” Lieber said. “It now appears that there is another episode where that failure to timely report is even more extreme.”
Taylor’s attorney, Benjamin Pinczewski, wasn’t buying it.
“How could they not have know about it? The MTA tried to cover this up,” he told The Post.
Lieber said he asked MTA security chief Michael Kemper, a 30-year NYPD veteran, to look at “the whole shebang,” including how the teams are trained and how the around 350 EAGLE inspectors report incidents.
As he announced the EAGLE suspension late Thursday, he also called on rider to please pay the fare.
“We have to play by the rules or they start to fall apart,” he said.
EAGLE teams have checked fares on Select Bus Service routes since 2008 and expanded to local buses in 2023, but fare evasion on buses still climbed that year, from 36% in 2022 to 43% in 2023, and it hit 48% in the first half of 2026.
Subway fare evasion is about 10%, according to MTA data.
The MTA has said paid boardings on buses increased 7% when EAGLE teams are present.
Bus riders skipping the fare cost the MTA an estimated $568 million in 2024, the latest figure available, according to the fiscal watchdog Citizens Budget Commission.
Lee, 30, of Manhattan, said the teams are ineffective.
“[They’re like] ‘Hey, can you show me your card?’ and I’m like ‘No, I can’t actually show you anything,’ and I just walk past them,” he said.
Lee called the teams “a waste of money” and said he’s glad they’re gone for now.
Stella Nathenson, 19, an NYU student who rides buses around Manhattan called the teams “scary” and “unsettling,” and said many fare beaters she sees are older.
“When people don’t pay the fare, half the time it’s usually a person with a walker or a cane,” she said.
She said broken card readers have kept her from paying.
“I have avoided paying twice, and it’s just because the card doesn’t work — which is probably something they should fix,” she said.
Bus rider Jaime Madrid, 75, of Manhattan said an EAGLE team wrongly ticketed him two years ago on the M34-SBS, and he had to send in his yellow card and bus number to get it tossed.
“They embarrass you,” he said. “They pull you out like a criminal. They pull on you and put you in the street.”
Mayor Zohran Mamdani ran on on a campaign promise of making city buses free, but the state-controlled MTA is mostly out of his hands, and he admitted in April that it wouldn’t happen this year.