Gene Russianoff is best known for his work fighting for subway riders. He is a New Yorker whose work has a tangible effect on the daily lives of almost all New Yorkers. NY1's Budd Mishkin filed the following One on 1 profile.
Gene Russianoff is an important New Yorker. He has it in writing: a 2010 New York Magazine list of most important New Yorkers.
Russianoff: Nora Ephron, the incredibly great writer, suggested Gail Collins, who is, you know, my favorite editorial writer. She suggested me.
Mishkin: Nice.
Russianoff: And I called her up and said "You've made my whole life."
Mishkin: (laughs)
Gene Russianoff is many things. Brooklynite, born and bred. Husband. Father. Harvard-trained lawyer. But in New York, Russianoff is known for one thing, even to a potentially sketchy character he once met on the C train.
"The train stalled between stations, so he keeps approaching, and he's really like doing the, he says 'Excuse me, but are you the subway guy? You're doing a great job,'" Russianoff says.
The subway guy. Yes, Russianoff is credited for his role on issues like creating an Independent Budget Office and sending multi-lingual voter guides at election time. But since 1978, he's been best known for his work on behalf of the New York Public Interest Research Group's Straphangers Campaign.
"People assume that we're really angry and we hate the system," Russianoff says. "We love the system."
Russianoff is a constant presence on television, radio and in the papers, taking on City Hall, Albany and the MTA on behalf of the nearly 6 million daily subway riders.
He is known for his creativity.
"There's definitely something of the performance artist in the work I do," he says.
"If you have an issue, and it doesn't make the TV and radio and the papers, does anybody care about it? So, you've got to figure out how to get in the news in a very crowded and expensive media market when you have no money."
Indeed, Russianoff and his colleagues have tried just about everything to garner attention and make their points. Posters. His annual Pokey and Schleppie Awards for slow bus service. Even a name contest.
"We asked people to come up with names for subway cars, and the winner was A Streetcar Named Perspire," he says.
But Russianoff is quite serious about the role of New York's transit system. It's not simply about getting trains from one station to another, but about social justice and economic fairness.
"I heard the chairman say that a 30-cent fare increase is a modest fare increase," he once said in 1999. "You talk to the 6 million daily subway and bus riders in this city, they would not say 30 cents each way is modest. They would use the word 'whopping.'"
Russianoff sees it as a subject that touches on so many aspects of life in the city.
"I love talking to people about the subways," he says. "For me, it's the history and the city, it's the role that crime plays in city life, it's about real estate. It's about everything."
Russianoff has taken on all types of subway causes, from fixing the dilapidated Franklin Avenue shuttle in Brooklyn to realizing the dream of unlimited MetroCard rides and free transfers between subways and buses. One issue, however, has become especially personal for Russianoff: handicapped accessibility. In 2012, he was diagnosed with Parkinson's.
"When I'm at a station without an escalator or an elevator, it makes things difficult," Russianoff says. "If there's one silver lining to my health issues, it's that you get on a subway car with a cane, and like everybody gets out of their seat and offers you their seat and lunch. New Yorkers are unbelievably good-hearted."
Russianoff has a personality that one might not associate with the rough-and-tumble of his work.
"I'm fairly thin-skinned," he says. "I'm constantly turning to people and saying, 'I'm not a terrible person, am I?'"
He was raised first in Brighton Beach and then Sheepshead Bay. Family lore has it that Russianoff tried to run away to Coney Island when he was 5 by taking the subway. He spent the 1970s at Brooklyn College and then Harvard Law School.
While some of his colleagues chose a path that led to corner offices in corporations or big-time law firms, Russianoff chose public interest work.
"My mom said she never considered me a real lawyer. And after she died, I was going through her records and she had this giant scrapbook of things that I had worked on. She was a fan in her own way," he says.
"I didn't start out with some goal of being an advocate for subways, but then I discovered it just was a ton of fun."
But not always. He is respected by supporters and adversaries alike, but his passion will occasionally ebb.
"It's four hours later than they said it was going to be. Most of the Council people have left the room. Those that are staying in the room are not the most receptive to the point you have to make. And you think like, 'Why am I doing this?'" he says.
His thoughts on government workers have evolved, thanks, in part, to the fact that his wife, Pauline Toole, is the commissioner of the Department of Records and Information Services in the de Blasio administration.
"I started with a very negative view of people in government. It wasn't for me. I thought they had to make terrible compromises," he says.
"After three-plus decades, I've met a lot of really wonderful people in government who are doing great work against enormous odds, who are trying to move the ball forward in a different way than I am."
The couple has two daughters who, not surprisingly, have always had a pretty good handle on the subway system.
"The first day of school, I said, 'How did traveling go?' and she said 'Well, we took the so and so to the L, but you can also take this to this. I have three different routes so if there's any problems and things aren't running, I'll have alternatives.' And I thought, 'Oh, that's my daughter,'" Russianoff said.
For all of his health issues, Gene Russianoff is still ready, willing and able to fight the good fight for subway riders, with passion and a wink. On this occasion, he's offering the MTA a creative proposal to get the governor's support for additional funding.
"We'd like you to consider renaming the MetroCard the Cuomo Card," he says.
"One of the chief honchos of the MTA goes, 'You still got it, kid.' So that felt good."
The Straphangers Campaign will release its ratings for all subway lines later this summer. It is currently collecting data on the slowest city buses to give out the annual Pokey and Schleppy Awards in November.