NYPD Commissioner Bill Bratton turned on the city’s former leaders Sunday, saying the department had a terrible morale problem when he took over because of the way his predecessor, Ray Kelly, and former Mayor Bloomberg used stop-and-frisk.
“Morale coming into this department was awful,’’ he told WABC-TV’s “Up Close with Diana Williams.”
“I”ll be quite frank with you. I don’t think I have an officer that comes up to me that doesn’t thank me . . . for improving morale.
“For whatever reason, a variety of reasons, despite their successes at reducing crime, keeping the city safe from terrorism, morale in this organization is awful.
“The public didn’t understand that, politicians didn’t understand it, but it was a very dispirited organization. I think beat down over several years, beaten up by the political establishment.’’
When asked point-blank by Williams if he thought Bloomberg and Kelly went too far, Bratton said: “In terms of stop, question and frisk, certainly.”
He did credit Kelly and Bloomberg for doing “a great job in the sense of keeping the community safe, keeping crime down.’’
But, he added, “One of the tools used to do that was used too extensively,’’ a reference to “stop and frisk.’’
As a result, he said, Kelly and Bloomberg’s “legacy’’ will include a federal monitor and a larger Civilian Complaint Review Board.
He anticipates no trouble with either body, saying, “If we’re doing what we’re supposed to be doing, they may have very little to do, so we’ll see as we go forward.”
Bratton said his officers will still stop and frisk suspicious persons.
“Stop, question and frisk ’ is as basic to my business as cameras are to yours, he told Williams.
But he said he’s reduced the stops by 80 to 90 percent.
Republished with permission of The New York Post
