Cops still schmoozing despite order
OH, was there a memo from the mayor? It must have gone to spam! The day The Post reported that Mayor Adams warned NYPD officers not to stand around in groups yakking but to do their jobs, I found lots of officers standing in groups and yakking.
On a stroll Wednesday night around 7 p.m. from Sixth Avenue and West 23rd Street to the corner of Lafayette and Great Jones streets, I passed multiple locations where uniformed cops cheerfully danced upon Adams’ orders.
Eight of them clustered outside a patrol car on Fifth Avenue at East 20th Street. Others idled in small bunches in Washington Square Park while roller bladers and bicyclists zoomed through groups of teens and children and a shirtless maniac scared the pants off of everyone.
On Thursday morning, two officers stood uselessly chatting on the mezzanine of the Lexington Avenue and 77th Street No. 6 station. They showed no apparent interest in the platform below, where straphangers are most vulnerable.
Mezzanine-lolling remains the norm in stations from 138th Street in the South Bronx to Jefferson Street in Brooklyn to Bowling Green in Manhattan, despite repeated claims by City Hall and the MTA that cops would spend more time patrolling platforms.
If the mayor and Police Commissioner Keechant Sewell truly mean to motivate idling foot soldiers, it will take more than a memo to the rank-and-file.
Too many cops have adopted a see-no-evil attitude. Their own union leaders now advise them to “proceed with caution when taking any police action which could lead to physical engagement” lest it subject officers to personal legal liability.
The NYPD remains as magnificent as ever in matters of life and death. Cops put themselves in harm’s way every day. No police force anywhere can best the Big Apple’s for courage and competence when it comes to protecting the public from mortal danger.
But it’s a different story altogether in cases of lesser but indispensable enforcement.
Cops were never thrilled to break up quality-of-life violations, not even when “broken windows” policing commanded greater respect than it does today. But the men and women in blue largely did what was asked of them.
Today, though — as any New Yorker who spends as much time as I do on streets, on subways and in parks knows — lots of cops throw up their hands en masse. They work their cellphones while ignoring obviously deranged, potentially dangerous characters who menace everyone around them.
There are no statistics to back up my observations. But, “The cops just stood around” has become as common a line among my fellow citizens as complaints about the weather.
NYPD morale is at its lowest in decades, as shown by a rush to quit or retire.
The reasons are obvious — but mostly immaterial.
Yes, the near-extinction of stopand-frisk made cops’ jobs harder.
Yes, they feel futile when suspects they arrest are immediately released to commit more criminal acts, thanks to insane “bail reform.”
Yes, they’re vilified by racebaiters who want to defund the police and unappreciated by elected officials who pander to the activists.
But nobody said that being a cop is an easy job. Some aren’t doing it. They’ll continue not doing it unless Adams and Sewell read commanders the riot act — and make examples of those who ignore them.