Brooklyn Borough President Addresses 'Bombshell' NY Times Report On NYPD Diversity

Press release from the Office of the Brooklyn Borough President:

Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams delivered testimony to the City Council Committee on Oversight and Investigations for a joint oversight hearing with the Committee on Public Safety on Racism, Bias, and Hate Speech in the New York City Police Department (NYPD). The oversight hearing comes after a bombshell report in The New York Times in November found several hateful posts on a popular law enforcement message board called Rant from a user who went by the name “Clouseau,” revealed to be a pseudonym for Deputy Inspector James F. Kobel, the head of the Equal Employment and Opportunity Division (EEOD) in the NYPD. Inspector Kobel was placed on modified assignment following the publication of the report.

In his testimony, Borough President Adams notes that the NYPD continues to struggle with a diversity problem within its ranks, and urges the Council to institute measures requiring greater oversight measures to promote diversity and ensuring officers who speak out about systemic issues within the department are protected from retaliation. He notes the persistence of a phenomenon, which dates back to his time in the department, of a “Black Track,” in which officers of color are moved up the ranks while being kept away from any leadership roles.

“Since I co-founded 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement Who Care when I served in the NYPD, I have been intimately aware of the systemic racism within the department. The unmasking of ‘Clouseau’ only underscores how far we have yet to go in tearing down the barriers standing in the way of Black and Brown officers. The steps laid out in my testimony can help foster a culture of accountability and trust, which is necessary to repairing the internal and external rifts that have been exposed over the course of this painful year. I thank Chairs Ritchie Torres and Adrienne Adams for holding this important hearing, and for their leadership,” said Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams.

Borough President Adams, who retired from the NYPD in 2006 at the rank of captain, put forward the following proposals in his testimony during the hearing today:

• EEOD leadership must have a demonstrated commitment to a cohesive, equitable, and inclusive department.
• There must be additional protections and protocols for officers who speak out against the systemic harms that plague communities of color both in and out of the department.
• The case review process must ensure that all complaints are treated fairly and equally.
• EEOD should partner with an outside entity that can audit and review discretionary promotions and assignments.
• The NYPD should seek to increase diversity by allowing school safety officers, transit enforcement officers, and New York City Department of Homeless Services (DHS) peace officers, among others, to use their experience, rather than standard educational requirements, to become full NYPD officers.

Borough President Adams also reiterated his call from earlier this summer to create a process whereby community boards and precinct councils would play a role in selecting the leadership of the precincts in their community. Under the proposed process, these bodies would be involved with candidate vetting and have veto power over selections if they have a supermajority.

The link to the full testimony is available here.

This press release was produced by the Office of the Brooklyn Borough President. The views expressed are the author's own.