GET used to it, New Yorkers – subway fares are going up.
And then you hear how the subway treated Emmitt Peeples – a proud kid who works hard in school despite learning disabilities that would flatten a lesser child – and you wish you could put the Transit Authority permanently out of business.
Emmitt, 14, was born severely premature. Still, he’s able to travel alone. And he’s trying, hard, to learn to read.
The teen should be applauded, not berated. But that’s not what happened on Nov. 17, when this child came up against a rude and lazy transit employee – every human in this city knows the type.
And it happened at a time the transit folks are plotting to raise fares for anyone who buys rides at a discount.
It was a Saturday, and Emmitt went down to the No. 6 subway station at 149th Street in The Bronx, on his way to meet a friend. But the boy got flustered by a MetroCard machine he could not read. He’d forgotten how to use it.
So Emmitt did what we were told to do the day token-booth clerks were turned into customer-service employees. He approached a woman in a booth, and asked for help.
Emmitt’s earnest question was answered with a curt question.
“What grade are you in?” the clerk demanded from behind glass. Emmitt sheepishly said he attended eighth grade.
“Oh, my 6-year-old can do it. You need to learn how to read and do it yourself,” the clerk said, refusing to help.
“He came home nearly in tears,” said the boy’s mother, Kimberly Medina. “He was upset.”
Emmitt’s stepfather, Luis Mujica, later confronted the clerk, whose badge number was partially concealed.
“Oh, do you think you’re intimidating me?” the woman taunted.
Emmitt’s mother is fuming. His stepdad is furious. And Emmitt is afraid of riding the train.
“How many other people who have a disability are too ashamed to step forward?” his mom asked.
She got nowhere when she called to complain. But transit spokesman Paul Fleuranges promised me there’d be an investigation.
“This is not the kind of customer service that we want of our agents in the field to provide to our customers,” he said.
Lousy service. Abusive employees. Rising fares.
That’s life underground.