MTA’s best additional time earner raked in almost $300K past year

A Prolonged Island Rail Highway repairman scooped up $218,877 in overtime pay out previous year — making him the MTA’s leading OT earner, according to new info.

In complete, Junior D. Lambert made $298,520 — extra than triple his $78,832 foundation pay out, and up from the $240,701 he took property in 2018, knowledge produced Tuesday by the Empire Heart fiscal-watchdog team reveals.

Knowledgeable that he was the MTA’s reigning OT king, Lambert, an MTA personnel because 1997, claimed he was merely performing his task.

“I just go to work, do the additional time, and which is how it goes. They have a list of the time beyond regulation sheet, and it goes by seniority, and everybody gets known as to operate,” he instructed The Submit.

“I just say sure more than the upcoming male that says no.”

But Lambert’s OT tab was $125,270 much less than that of the prior year’s major earner, Main Measurement Operator Thomas Caputo, who billed the company for $344,147 of OT in 2018 on his way to an company-higher $461,646.

Transit officials vowed to crack down on overtime grifting pursuing stories of Caputo’s unbelievable hours and other LIRR substantial rollers, who accounted for nine of the MTA’s 10 maximum-compensated workforce in 2018.

4 LIRR foremen raked in as a lot as $146,800 in OT — 23 per cent of their collective OT tab — for hrs they have been actually traveling to and from worksites, the MTA Inspector Basic said in Oct.

Amongst the OT cheats was Raymond Murphy, who investigators caught lounging at house when he was supposedly operating extra time.

The IG’s report instructed the apply of billing vacation time as OT was “widespread” — many thanks to an unofficial “handshake” settlement involving the LIRR and its labor unions.

But the Empire Centre report located the agency — and the LIRR — reined in time beyond regulation paying in 2019 considerably compared with the prior year’s figures.

Among 2017 and 2018, the MTA’s OT spiked by $420 million, or 16 percent, to nearly $1.4 billion. Very last year, the MTA expended $1.24 billion on OT — eight % much less than in 2018, but however 46 p.c more than in 2014, according to the Empire Middle.

The LIRR and the New York City Transit Authority — which operates Major Apple buses and subways — account for the entirety of the diminished shelling out, as other MTA subdivisions noticed OT paying rise from concerning a person to eight p.c.

Even so, 4 of last year’s major five overtime earners have been however LIRR personnel.

Past year’s slight training course correction elevated then-Transit President Andy Byford from No. 21 to No. 2 on the agency’s listing of maximum-paid out staff members in general, raking in a minimal above $360,000.