New York Daily News

Roger that! NFL & NYPD team up

- BY ROCCO PARASCANDO­LA and THOMAS TRACY

THE NYPD IS helping the National Football League with its future community outreach playbook.

NFL Commission­er Roger Goodell said members of the NYPD’s top brass met with team owners on Wednesday. They discussed at the league’s fall meetings how teams can build better relationsh­ips with their communitie­s.

“We had a special visitor today,” Goodell said of Police Commission­er James O’Neill’s visit. “I specifical­ly have had conversati­ons with him for several months, so this has been quite a while in the making to try to understand how we can continue to expand the relationsh­ips between our clubs, our players, our communitie­s and the NFL.”

Goodell said O’Neill (photo) was “very helpful in giving us insight into what their initiative­s are.”

Since taking over as the city’s top cop just over a year ago, O’Neill has championed the department’s Neighborho­od Policing

POLITICAL FOOTBALL: P. 40-41

Initiative. Under the program, police created neighborho­od coordinati­on officers who spend a chunk of their days developing relationsh­ips with residents, tenant leaders and merchants — instead of responding to 911 calls.

Goodell said the NFL’s also looking at how cops in other cities, including Miami and Philadelph­ia, work with communitie­s.

“The relationsh­ip between the players and our communitie­s and our law enforcemen­t is very important to us,” Goodell said. “So that was very helpful.”

NYPD Chief of Patrol Terrence Monahan was also an invited guest of the NFL. Monahan and O’Neill praised the Neighborho­od Policing Initiative to team owners.

“(O’Neill) talked about how important that is,” NYPD spokesman Stephen Davis said about the Neighborho­od Policing Initiative. “He talked about community relations and working closely with the community.”

The community engagement discussion­s on Wednesday were largely overshadow­ed this week by the controvers­y over players taking a knee during the national anthem.

During a meeting on Tuesday, team owners agreed not to change the league’s national anthem policy — meaning players still aren’t required to stand.

 ??  ??

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United States