Transit union officials, charging that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority has not done enough to prepare workers for the possibility of a terrorist attack, said yesterday that they had hired a Israeli security expert to train subway and bus workers in recognizing suspicious packages and passengers.þþOn Sunday, about 50 workers will take either a four-hour class on terrorism awareness or an eight-hour class on deterrence. The classes, at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, are being financed by the Transport Workers Union of America, Local 100, which represents 32,000 workers at New York City Transit. þþThe president of Local 100, Roger Toussaint, said the authority had done little to reassure workers since the July 7 subway and bus bombings in London, which killed at least 56 people.þþÿWe have not received any communication, even a phone call, from the M.T.A. regarding union input, or even a briefing, on what their plans are in the aftermath of London,ÿ Mr. Toussaint said. ÿThis is consistent with the freezing-out of the workforce regarding the security needs of the subway and bus environment.ÿþþA spokesman for the authority, Tom Kelly, said the union's announcement was a groundless bid for publicity. Since January 2002, he said, 44,567 employees have gone through a two-hour ÿeyes and earsÿ class on how to recognize suspicious behavior or packages and about 11,000 have completed an eight-hour course on preventing fires and evacuating passengers.þþÿOur major concern is protecting the employees and the customers - and evacuating them from any kind of dangerous situation,ÿ Mr. Kelly said. ÿThe first-responder duty should be left to the proper authorities, and those are the Police and Fire Departments.ÿ þþThe union has said that train operators and conductors, along with bus drivers, station agents and station cleaners, are on the front lines in preventing or responding to an attack. þþEd Watt, the union secretary-treasurer, who sits on the authority's board as a nonvoting member, said the training provided by the authority had been largely meaningless. Rank-and-file workers were shown a short video and given a brochure on security awareness, but many workers might not have read it, he said.þþThe brochure, distributed in June 2004, was prepared by the Interagency Counterterrorism Task Force in the authority's Police Department, which patrols the authority's two commuter railroads, as well as Grand Central Terminal and Pennsylvania Station. (The New York Police Department is responsible for the subways.)þþThe brochure advises workers to be alert to several characteristics that might be associated with a suicide bomber, like or ill-fitting clothing, ÿrepeated patting of the self,ÿ and unusual or excessively heavy baggage. It also warns workers to beware of riders who are unaware of their surroundings or extremely nervous. It offers ÿheavy smoking, glaring from side to side, pacing or moving about without apparent purposeÿ as examples of nervousness. þþThe union-financed training will be led by Raphael Ron, who from 1997 to 2001 was chief of security for the Israel Airports Authority, where he primarily oversaw the country's largest airport near Tel Aviv. He now runs a consulting firm, New Age Security Solutions, in McLean, Va.þþMr. Ron, in a telephone interview, said that training transit workers should be given the highest priority. ÿBy not doing so, we are giving up the most important asset we have in defending ourselves,ÿ he said. þþ
Source: NY Times
