As part of a new initiative by the NYPD, the 114th Precinct will change the way they dispatch officers to the neighborhood.
Starting Oct. 3, the precinct will be broken up into four sectors instead of 13. Each sector will have two designated neighborhood coordination officers (NCOs) who will engage the community and identify recurring problems in specific patrol areas.
According to Captain Peter Fortune, the commanding officer of the 114th Precinct, the NYPD will be pulling officers from specialized units such as anti-crime, traffic and domestic violence and assigning them to specific sectors to foster relationships with community members.
These NCOs will not answer 911 calls – this responsibility will be given exclusively to eight steady sector officers, who will also be assigned to the same sector every day – but will patrol the same streets to identify crime patterns and address quality-of-life issues. The officers will also patrol the areas on bicycle and foot so that they are not confined to vehicles all day.
“We asked these sector cars to interact with the community,” Fortune said. “The problem is we never gave them time to interact with the community. They ran from job to job, 911 call to 911 call. They never had the time or the opportunity to really get to know who they were serving.”
Previously, the precinct would assign half of the officers to specialized units and half to answer 911 calls. Now, officers will be assigned to specialized units, eight officers will only answer 911 calls and spend some time patrolling the neighborhood and the NCOs will exclusively interact with community members in their designated sectors.
“The [NCOs] have been handpicked by me,” Fortune said. “They’re well-rounded people. They know how to talk to people. They’re problem solvers. We’ve sent them to some really great training.”
Issues with graffiti, parking, panhandling and other quality-of-life issues will now be reported to NCOs and taken back to the 114th Precinct for a coordinated solution. They will also attend civic association meetings, street fairs and other community events.
According to the NYPD’s website, the NCOs have received training in mediation, conflict resolution, public speaking, crime analysis, connecting residents with social-service resources and special operations functions such as crime prevention, domestic violence and policing in the public housing developments.
NCOs for the 114th Precinct will not be assigned to police the public housing developments. PSA 9, which is the precinct in charge of the developments, will have its own NCO program.
This program has been implemented in other precincts across the city and according to Fortune, it has led to a decrease in violence and shootings and an increase in community interaction.
The sectors and officers assigned to them are as follows:
Sector A from Astoria Boulevard South to 37th Avenue and Steinway Street to the Brooklyn Queens Expressway will be patrolled by Officers Mariusz Krala and Thomas Lewandowski. They can be reached at mariusz.krala@nypd.org and thomas.lewandowski@nypd.org.
Sector B encompasses 19th Avenue to Astoria Boulevard North, 20th Avenue to Hoyt Avenue North and Shore Boulevard to 81st Street. Officers Apostolos Masouridis and Monique Holly will patrol the area. They can be reached at apostolos.masouridis@nypd.org and monique.holly@nypd.org.
Sector C from Astoria Boulevard South to Northern Boulevard, Hoyt Avenue South to Northern Boulevard and the east side of Steinway Street to 21st Street will be patrolled by Officers Borys Bedoya and Carl Ferraro. They can be reached at borys.bedoya@nypd.org and carl.ferraro@nypd.org.
Sector D will include Astoria Park South to Queens Plaza North and the west side of 21st Street to Main Street. Officers Keith Matthes and Joseph Esposito will patrol the area. They can be reached at keith.matthes@nypd.org and joseph.esposito@nypd.org.
