The best way to cut down on taxicab violence is to put undercover police officers behind the wheel, says a safety committee for New York taxis.

Fed up with 18 taxi drivers being killed in one year in the late 1970s, New York City cabbies and police devised a plan that dramatically reduced the amount of crime committed against drivers, said David Pollack, executive director of the New York Committee for Taxi Safety.

One officer from each division was assigned to drive in the cab undercover. It wasn't so much the officers in the cabs who made the difference, but the message to criminals, said Pollack.

Rather than make the initiative a secret and hope to catch criminals, the approach a proactive one.

'Don't wait for another cabbie to be assaulted or killed. Do it now.'—David Pollack

The taxi companies and police launched a media campaign using billboards, newspapers, radio and TV let criminals know "an undercover police officer could be your driver. Let's hope you don't have to find out."

Stickers with the slogan were also put on the cabs, said Pollack, a third generation New York cab driver and the author of a monthly newspaper publication called "Taxi Insider."

The campaign resulted in not only a huge drop in assaults against cabbies but in other crimes as well, Pollack said.

Criminals also cut back on using cabs for other purposes, such as transporting drugs and weapons, or trying to get away from a crime scene, he said.

'Shields and cameras just aren't as effective as this campaign.'—David Pollack

"If you're a bad guy and you think there is even remote possibility that the driver of the cab might be a police officer, you're not going to be a bad guy while you're in that taxi cab," he said.

Winnipeg needs to take a drastic approach like that to target the rash of crimes the city is seeing, Pollack suggested.

"Don't wait for another cabbie to be assaulted or killed. Do it now," he said. "Shields and cameras just aren't as effective as this campaign."

Fourteen cab drivers have been attacked in Winnipeg since the beginning of January, including three on the weekend.

Four cabs have also been stolen in that time and one driver suffered brain damage after being beaten.

Phil Walding, general manager of Duffy's Taxi, welcomes any strategies that help protect drivers but doubts the New York campaign would be undertaken in Winnipeg.

"I do know that during the preliminary discussions that we've had with the police, that they seem to have an issue with assigning resources to the taxi industry," he said.

"So I don't know how receptive they're going to be to giving up an undercover police officer on a regular basis."