Transforming the NYPD
The NYPD is a violent, unaccountable, multibillion-dollar bureaucracy that answers to no one outside the department. But New Yorkers’ calls to divest from the NYPD and reinvest funds into our communities have gone unanswered.
Here’s how you can take immediate action to reduce the size, scope, and power of the NYPD in our communities and demand that funding instead be allocated to New Yorkers’ real needs.
Disband the NYPD's Most Dangerous Units
The NYPD's Strategic Response Group (SRG) and Vice Enforcement Division are two of the department's most dangerous units, specially trained and resourced to terrorize our communities. These specialized units have long, troubling histories of violence, abuse, and aggressive tactics. Vice officers routinely use their badges to exploit, sexually harass, and otherwise terrorize sex workers, while the Strategic Response Group has taken over New York's streets to brutalize and arrest protesters – especially those calling for an end to police abuse. The Vice squad and the SRG are pointless units that endanger New Yorkers while wasting tens of millions of dollars. To fundamentally transform the NYPD, we can begin by disbanding both of these specialized units and reinvesting funds into supporting New Yorkers' real needs like housing, education, and mental health care.
Get Cops Out of Schools
New York City deploys more than 5,300 police officers to patrol our public schools. Cops outnumber social workers and guidance counselors in New York City schools by more than two to one. For decades, police in schools have overwhelmingly targeted Black and Latinx students, brutalizing them, criminalizing their youthful behavior, and making their schools feel more like prisons. New York City lawmakers must significantly reduce the money spent on policing Black and Brown communities, and use that money to protect school budgets. We must get cops out of the classroom and invest in real education solutions.
Increase Transparency & Accountability
NYPD officers have an enormous amount of power to impact the lives of thousands of New Yorkers every year. Though the department remains stubbornly resistant to full transparency and accountability, the NYCLU has obtained thousands of documents that shine an important light on the actions and abuses of NYPD officers. These documents – which include records of abuse allegations, stop-and-frisk data, and use of force reports – help paint a clearer picture of what one of the largest and most influential police departments on earth is up to.
