Mayor Eric Adams is up for a bruising veto fight as he barrels towards killing a controversial bill pushed through by the City Council that will force NYPD officers to file more detailed reports after every street stop — even the most minor ones.
Council sources said Adams is expected on Friday to veto that bill and another that bans solitary confinement in Big Apple jails — both of which Hizzoner has railed against, along with the police and jail guard unions.
The council approved both measures late last year with veto-proof majorities, though the policing bill, dubbed the “How Many Stops Act,” passed by a slimmer 35-9 margin, with three abstentions.
To kill it, Adams would have to yank at least two lawmakers into the nay column and make sure others don’t change their votes. Turning back the solitary bill is a much heavier lift, as City Hall would have to persuade five council members to change their votes.
The bill requiring cops to file slightly more intricate reports is especially contentious, with police sources telling The Post that it could tack on time to officers’ already lengthy shifts, while Adams claims it would bog down cops in never-ending paperwork.
“By having officers spend time taking down additional, unnecessary information, the NYPD will have to spend more time on paperwork,” Adams says in a cartoonish, city-made video he posted on X Thursday.
“Do we want our cops doing paperwork? Or police work?”
He again slammed the bill — 586-A — later Thursday morning at a press conference announcing the arrest of an alleged serial stabber who randomly attacked a handful of people over the last two weeks.
“When you are taking a dangerous suspect off the street, every second matters,” Adams said, claiming the bill would have slowed detectives’ work to a glacial pace.
“Every second matters, that is why I think the intention of making sure we properly have transparency is getting in the way of the operational aspect of that,” he said.
“And I think this case personifies why we have a great deal of concern, because I don’t want our officers to spend a substantial amount of time filling out paperwork when I need them to do police work and swiftly bring someone to justice,” he continued. “So this could really impact investigations of this nature.”
The bill’s proponents say the NYPD already collects most of the information it requires, so cops will only have to add a few extra grains of information to their reports.
“The mayor — who will be charged with implementing this bill — is actively undermining and misinforming people, including new recruits,” said New York City Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who has claimed that the changes would add just a few minutes to cops’ days.
“This is a dangerous precedent being set,” he continued. “I have never seen this amount of deceptive practices and deception and misinformation in all of my years.”
Not everyone agreed.
“Jumanne Williams has no idea what it takes to be a cop,” Councilmember Robert Holden, a Queens Democrat, told The Post.
“He’s clueless,” Holden continued. “I’ve rode with the cops and I talk with the COs (commanding officers). This guy is totally disengaged from reality. This is all about handcuffing police. This is all anti-public safety.
“I hope the mayor can convince other council members to not override the veto,” he added.
Under the NYPD patrol guide, officers must record detailed information about so-called level 3 investigative stops, which are when a cop either arrests someone or has “reasonable suspicion” to detain them.
But less is required of a “level 1” stop, which could be something like simply questioning a potential witness, or a “level 2” stop, which could be interviewing a potential suspect.
Currently, officers only have to check a box saying they conducted a level 1 stop.
Under the new bill, they would have to “guess” the race, gender and age of the people they encounter, then add that to their report.
Police sources said cops can rack up on average about two dozen level 1 stops each day.
Level 2 stops require a bit more detail, including the aforementioned demographic information, how the cops stopped the person and why they chose to do so.
If the bill becomes law — which it is set to do should Adams not veto it on Friday — that would change to note whether cops had to use force during their encounter, which would move the stop to a level 3 incident.
Adams’ strong opposition to the bill may help him politically, as the former NYPD captain leans into being the pro-policing, law-and-order mayor who made public safety a broad plank of his electoral platform, political insiders told The Post.
Council sources, however, suggested that the mayor is choosing to die on this hill because he wants to boost his poll numbers by appearing pro-cop.
“[His administration] was just working on this with us a few months ago,” one source said.
But even if the added details don’t bury cops in reams of paperwork, as opponents of the bill have claimed, officers worry the data will be deeply flawed — because they are simply guessing at the race, age and gender of whom they’re talking to.
They also fear it will just give politicians ammunition when they say cops are stopping too many people.
In addition, the bill requires the NYPD to issue quarterly reports on each of the three kinds of stops — something that was previously reserved only for level 3 encounters.
“It’s data they are going to use to push their narrative,” one concerned source said. “They are going to make this data say what they want it to say, and it’s going to put cops in a bad light.”
