Melissa Mark-Viverito, meet Leonard Roberts — the latest poster boy for why, as Police Commissioner Bill Bratton said Thursday, New York City needs Broken Windows policing “now more than ever.”
As The Post reported, police on Saturday saw Roberts, 45, biking on the sidewalk in Brooklyn — one of six low-level quality-of-life crimes that Speaker Mark-Viverito and many of her City Council colleagues want decriminalized.
The cops stopped him, ran his name — and discovered a long rap sheet, including an open violation. They also found a stolen, illegal and loaded .380 Baikal pistol in his backpack.
Under Mark-Viverito’s proposal, officers stopping someone for biking on the sidewalk couldn’t demand ID, so any perp could give a fake name and address. The cops could only issue a civil summons, then send the suspect on his merry way.
Which is why Mayor Bill de Blasio this week was so outspoken in disagreeing with Mark-Viverito, warning against making “adjustments in a manner that might compromise safety and order.”
Bratton cited The Post story Thursday as he presented a 41-page report on Broken Windows: “That quality-of-life bicycle stop, which is complained about in that area, was in fact something that was essential in getting a gun off the street and getting basically a career criminal once again put back in the system.”
You see why Bratton called Broken Windows “one of the underpinnings of reducing crime in this city over the last 20-plus years.”
The report outlines how Broken Windows “more than any other factor” has transformed New York from a national crime capital to a truly safe city.
Because, as Bratton rightly notes, more misdemeanor arrests lead to fewer felony arrests. And also to much lower incarceration rates — because Broken Windows prevents crime, rather than simply fighting it.
Yes, adjustments can be made; as Bratton says, “arrests and summonses aren’t the only answer.” But a rush to decriminalize low-level crimes undercuts the whole notion of Broken Windows.
The speaker should seek some compromise that achieves some of her goals but also meets Bratton’s bottom line of “protecting the right of the officers to start the process, with the stop, with the identification.” That requirement, he notes, is even less burdensome thanks to the new municipal IDs.
In the end, as the commissioner says, quality-of-life policing “is not about the blind pursuit of arrests. It’s about what it says it’s about: the quality of life in this city.”