New York: New York City Mayor Eric Adams reiterated his stance and urged the city council lawmakers to veto the ‘controversial policing bill 586-A’.
Addressing the weekly in-person media availability in the City Hall, Adams said his job is to raise his voice in favor of ordinary New Yorkers. The bill passed by the city council is creating a trust deficit between the citizens and the police, because citizens may not feel comfortable sharing whatever they are supposed to share with the police officials since the bill has empowered police officials to maintain records of public statements.
The bill undermines community-oriented policing. I will try to persuade the lawmakers to veto the legislation.
“I know when I have communicated with some of the City Council members, some of them have shared, that my constituency doesn’t believe this. My constituency believes that this is a harmful bill. Some of them have said that, you know, if they were able to vote with their conscience, they would not vote for this bill,” Adams said.
To a question, the Mayor said: “First of all, my job is to look at a bill that I believe is something that should not be passed, and I use my power of veto and I use my role as mayor to explain to the public. That’s my job. The job of the City Council people and the speaker is to use it and determine, whether they agree or disagree.
Some of them have indicated that they’re afraid to vote with their conscience, and I said we should be more fearful of our safety in this city than any other item.
And so we’re going to continue to speak with the councilmembers, tell them why this bill is extremely harmful to the foundation of our safety, and it’s up to them to make the determination. I did my job, and I’m continuing to do my job of educating and trying to get the council to come to understanding that this is not a good bill for the safety of our city. But it’s up to them to make that determination.
To another query, he said: “I think when you look at what we have done in the stop and frisk, because of some of the advocacy for 100 Blacks in Law Enforcement, myself, I testified in federal court, we were able to go from almost a million people being stopped every year. That includes those that were documented and undocumented. I think it was over 80 percent were Black and brown. We were able to really change the culture, you know, it is a kind of abuse to stop and frisk people.
I think the public is going to get offended. Why are you guessing my age, my race, my gender? I think there’s going to be a reluctance for people to interact. We want police and communities to interact. I think we’re making a big mistake on the credible reason for stopping someone
