NYC Enacts Racial Categorization Of Police Records

The New York City Council overrode the veto of Mayor Eric Adams (D) this week to enact a law that would catalog police records by race and gender, even down to interactions with the public. The action happened after the mayor, a former New York Police Department (NYPD) officer warned that it could have significant public safety implications.

The How Many Stops Act was passed by a large majority of the City Council, passing 42-9.

The decision backed by many of the Democratic members of the council would cause NYPD officers to record the race, gender and age of a large majority of the people they interact with, including for potential witnesses. Adams said that this would cause paperwork issues for the city and slow actual investigations.

The move was criticized by the NYPD Detectives Endowment Association President Paul DiGiacomo, who said that it was “one more step toward the city council goal: destroy the world’s best police department.”

Former NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton said that the “irony” regarding the new law is that “it will require more intrusive stops— and those stops will frequently be racially unbalanced in a minority majority city.”

He also said that the new act would “effectively discourage cops from interacting and talking with the public by requiring them to ask what many New Yorkers would understandably find intrusive and unnecessary questions about their race and gender which many would refuse to answer, requiring the officer to ‘guess.’”

The irony about the “How Many Stops Act” being proposed by some members in the City Council is that it will require more intrusive stops — and those stops will frequently be racially unbalanced in a minority majority city.

In my 1998 book, ‘Turnaround,’ I wrote: “The best cops… pic.twitter.com/JLy45z7v5S

— Bill Bratton (@CommissBratton) January 22, 2024

The action happened after New York City faced a sharp increase in crime over the past five years. Following the start of the 2020 George Floyd riots, New York saw its highest property and violent crime rates in almost 30 years.

Some forms of crime declined in 2022, but others, such as car theft, increased significantly in 2023. Furthermore, the city is facing a series of possible racially motivated attacks, including on Asian pedestrians and on the subway.

New York has struggled to handle the increase in crime, which often caused friction between the NYPD and members of the city’s government.

Furthermore, New York has taken in more than 150,000 migrants since 2022, sparking another major crisis that the mayor says could destroy the city. There has also been significant crime linked to the influx of migrants, who are currently housed in hotels, shelters and a former airfield.