May 7, 2025

Los Angeles, CA – Today, Chair of the Metro Board of Directors and Los Angeles County Supervisor Janice Hahn released the following statement in support of the selection of San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott to lead the forthcoming Metro Transit Community Public Safety Department:

“Chief Bill Scott’s track record speaks for itself. He leaves San Francisco with crime at its lowest level in decades, and he understands that public safety is about more than enforcement—it’s about service. He has long spoken about officers as guardians, not warriors. That philosophy is exactly what we need on our system—officers who ride with our passengers, who protect them, and who are there to help when people need it most.

As Chair of Metro, my priority is the safety of our riders and our Metro employees. The goal of this new department is to have a seamless approach to public safety, with highly trained sworn officers dedicated to Metro and visible on our buses and trains, mental health professionals responding to anyone in crisis, and compassionate homeless outreach teams who can get people who find themselves on the system the help they need. This is an ambitious undertaking and success starts with leadership.”

Chief Bill Scott’s roots as a police officer are in Los Angeles. He joined the LAPD in 1989 and spent much of his career working in South LA, rising to the rank of Deputy Chief overseeing the LAPD South Bureau.
During Hahn’s Chairship, Metro has added barriers to every bus in the fleet to better protect bus operators, is piloting weapons detection technology to keep guns and knives off the system, added lighting to stations, raised fare gates, and expanded the Tap to Exit initiative.