The city that never sleeps may find law enforcement and politicians need a wake-up call.
The New York Police Department said its falling employee numbers are “troubling,” with no sure signs of improvement.
“We’re living through very challenging times,” NYPD Chief of Personnel Martin Morales said, according to the New York Daily News. “We have officers retiring from all ranks, including very tenured investigators and very tenured supervisors.”
In an email from the NYPD to Fox News, the NYPD reported nearly double the retirement filings among officers as of October 6, 2020. A total of 2,385 officers submitted their retirement papers this year – an 87 percent increase over the same period in 2019.
“While the decision to retire is a personal one and can be attributed to a range of factors, it is a troubling trend that we are closely monitoring,” the spokesman said in the email.
At the heart of this issue, of course, are the polarizing ideas for how to support or reform the nation’s police forces.
In August, the New York City Police Benevolent Association, the largest police union in the U.S., endorsed President Donald Trump, in what is believed to be the union’s first-ever endorsement.
PBA President Pat Lynch sees more trouble ahead.
“Thanks to the City Council and Mayor’s ‘Defund the Police’ lunacy, no help is coming any time soon,” Lynch said. “Our elected leaders need to be held responsible for the dangerous path they’ve chosen.”
But the other side disagrees.
“During the Bloomberg era, the NYPD headcount went down by several thousand officers and crime went down as well,” said Josmar Trujillo of the Policing and Social Justice Project at Brooklyn College, in the Daily News story.
“There is no evidence that the size of the NYPD correlates with safety. The NYPD budget is already three times the size it was in the mid-90s. We spend too much money on police.”
It’s enough to keep citizens up at night.
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