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New NYPD 'Training' is Not Enough
Activists Demand Overhaul of 'Broken Windows' Based Policing & Officer
Accountability as City Council Holds Hearing With Commissioner Bratton

September 8th, 2014 City Hall-- New Yorkers Against Bratton, Bronxites for NYPD Accountability and
community activists are calling for an end to 'Broken Windows' based policing and new policies aimed at
increasing police accountability. The City Council's Public Safety Committee hearing on training
procedures for the NYPD falls woefully short of the changes that communities most impacted by
aggressive and sometimes fatal police encounters continue to call for.

The racially-disparate impact of Broken Windows on people of color in New York City (and beyond) has
became a reality for New Yorkers since the return of Bill Bratton--it's innovator in the 90's. The theory's
obsession with a zero-tolerance approach to low-level crime creates a drastic increase in interactions
between police and communities of color and is incompatible with the City's rhetoric of improved police-
community relations. The criminalization of people of color, the poor, homeless and even subway
performers should not be the focus of a city where crime is at historical lows and a new Mayoral
Administration and "progressive" City Council claim the NYPD is undergoing critical reforms.

Recently, Commissioner Bratton referred to unnamed local elected officials in a recent interview as having
been vocal about having more Broken Windows policing in their communities. It is quite telling that these
elected leaders have remained anonymous even as the death of Staten Island man Eric Garner over a
'quality-of-life' (a variant of Broken Windows) offense has spurned a new city-wide debate on NYPD
policy. So while city councilmembers holds a hearing on 'training' for the NYPD, observers should note
that the NYPD is one of the most-trained departments in the country. That the hearing is being held in the
context of the Garner chokehold death, one must also remember that chokeholds were banned by the
NYPD itself over 20 years ago.

'Training' is not the fundamental issue--policy is. An NYPD continuing a decades-old obsession with
offenses like selling cigarettes, spitting on the floor, riding a bike on a sidewalk or performing in the
subways will only make needless interactions and confrontations inevitable.

Additionally, the brutality that continues to be a key factor in the relationship between police and
communities of color will stay in place until it is acknowledged as a cultural problem within the
department. Training alone cannot address this. Training and an explicit banning did not prevent PO
Pantaleo from choking Eric Garner. Accountability starts from the top and Commissioner Bratton has not
been decisive when it comes to zero-tolerance for brutality as he's been for zero-tolerance of 'quality-of-
life' crime. The city council has similarly been useless in this effect. A congressional delegation from New
York last month called for a re-examination of Broken Windows policing (elaborate). Meanwhile, our local
city leaders have been virtually silent while focusing their energies on 'training'. This is unacceptable and
the community will publicly call them and Commissioner Bratton out on the steps of City Hall before their
hearing.