New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg is pushing back against members of the city council who want to pass legislation expanding the definition of “biased-based profiling.” Bloomberg and other opponents of the bill object to expanding existing laws that prohibit discrimination against marginalized populations.
The bill takes aim at the controversial police tactic known as “stop-and-frisk,” which allows police officers to stop any individual on the street and search them for weapons, drugs and other illegal items. The bill would allow police to chase leads that include descriptions of a person’s race and physical characteristics, but prohibit them from searching individuals based only on those descriptions.
Bloomberg and other stop-and-frisk supporters argue it is a legitimate police tactic that has taken illegal drugs and weapons off the streets. They claim the bill would hinder the police from doing their jobs.
Bloomberg lawyer Michael Best, in a letter sent to city council members and obtained by the New York Post, argued that the bill “would authorize new lawsuits that could result in a blanket prohibition against the use of stop, question and frisk in New York City — and potentially many other strategies and tactics used by the police to address and prevent crime.”
Critics of stop-and-frisk say it has been used in a discriminatory manner that allows police to target African-American and Latino youth based upon physical appearance and race. Bill sponsors Jumaane Williams and Brad Lander, both Brooklyn Democrats, said their proposal would expand existing city laws that prohibit this type of discrimination. They said it would include protections for other vulnerable populations, such as LGBT and homeless individuals.
Since enacted as police policy in 2002, the New York Police Department has conducted 5 million searches — 84 percent of which have targeted young African-American and Latino residents.
Nearly nine out of 10 people stopped have been completely innocent. This statistic has caused concern among civil rights groups like the American Civil Liberties Union, which claims the policy has become a discriminatory police practice.
The bill currently has 32 sponsors, just two shy of the number of votes needed to override a veto by Mayor Bloomberg.
Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Queens), a stop-and-frisk supporter who chairs the Public Safety Committee, said he would not hold a hearing on the bill.
“This won’t reform stop-and-frisk; it will end it. Police officers, for good reason, will not put themselves at the mercy of state judges and will refuse to get out of their cars,” said Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Queens) “As a result, criminals will again be emboldened, and crime will spike.”
While the number of stop-and-frisks dropped 51 percent in the first three months of 2013, murder rates have also plummeted 30 percent and overall crime has dropped 2.7 percent, according to NYPD statistics.