ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – Albuquerque police have been trying to make city buses safer for months. Risky business on board is why many people don’t dream of taking a ride.

Add to that the fact, the buses are often used as getaway rides for shoplifters or just a place to get high.

“There are some people that can get aggressive sometimes, and it’s our job to be on here and observe and report,” said Vanessa Garcia, an Albuquerque police service aide.

Garcia is an extra set of eyes and ears for officers. She rides a city bus eight hours a day, five days a week, talking to passengers.

“A lot of the time I’ve learned to just be respectful and kind, and they do the same,” said Garcia. 

She also watches for anything suspicious or illegal on board. Garcia handles the job with another Albuquerque PSA, and while they don’t intervene in serious situations, they do have access to the people who will. 

“They’re enmeshed within our system, so it’s a direct line of communication with police officers and our non-sworn transit safety officers,” Gerard Bartlett, commander of APD’s Crisis Intervention Division.  

The APD’s Crisis Intervention Division includes the transit safety section. 

“We want people to feel safe riding the bus. We want people to feel safe at the stops,” said Bartlett. 

Earlier this month, APD announced they made 100 felony arrests at bus stops in a two-week span. 

APD and the Bernalillo County Sheriff’s Office identified the Uptown Transit Center as a place where shoplifters will hop on a bus and make off with what they stole.

APD reps say they’ve worked on this problem with business owners in the past. 

“They start to learn about trends those businesses were seeing, times of days, the stops they were using and things like that,” Bartlett said. 

But shoplifting getaways aren’t what Garcia’s noticed on her route. Drugs, though, are a different story. 

“We see a lot of people that come on with narcotics sometimes. So when that happens, we’ll call it out right away and police officers or transit safety officers will come assist them off,” said Bartlett. 

Besides the PSAs, APD reps say they’ve added 2,600 cameras to city buses and bus stops.