The NYPD blue could soon be tied up in red-tape.
A proposed bill would force the city police to file millions of reports on even the most ordinary encounters with New Yorkers — prompting critics to blast the bill as potentially leading to massive overtime and diverting police from dealing with crime.
The legislation now passing though the City Council would require detailed forms to be filled out for something as simple as giving a tourist directions or asking people questions while attending to a sick train passenger.
The reports would involve recording information such as the race, age and gender of people officers interact with — which supporters of the bill say will help keep a handle on racial profiling.
Critics, however, say it would lead to a massive and costly amount of paperwork, as there are some seven million such contacts between cops and the public each year that would now have to be logged.
“This bill would make cops’ jobs harder and our city less safe,” Staten Island District Mike McMahon told The Post Tuesday.
“Is this how the majority of New Yorkers want their NYPD officers to spend their time, compiling reports on run of the mill encounters instead of patrolling their streets and communities?”
The plan is also opposed by Mayor Eric Adams’ administration, former Police Commissioner Bill Bratton and the pro-cop Common Sense Caucus of the Council — who all said the edict will handcuff the beat officers or hinder prosecutors.
Currently, the NYPD is only required to issue reports on “reasonable suspicion” stops, in which an officer has the legal authority to detain someone and prevent them from leaving, or stops involving arrests.
The legislation would expand that to require reporting on all levels of police stops and encounters.
That means actions as simple as talking to a manager or customer in a retail store during a walk-through or asking potential witnesses about the discovery of a swastika in a hate crime investigation would now be subject to the new forms, law enforcement sources said.
Cops are not currently required to issue detailed reports on such interactions as officers already record all encounters with their body cams, NYPD sources said.
The NYPD, in a statement, ripped the bill as an unnecessary layer of bureaucracy that “would be a big step backwards.”
“Under this bill, police officers would spend less time keeping New Yorkers safe and more time filling out paperwork — slowing response times and diverting officers from engaging with the public,” an NYPD spokesperson said.
As the city grapples to close a $7 billion budget gap, the bill would add millions of dollars in overtime costs that will mean “finding savings elsewhere in the city’s budget,” the NYPD said.
Mayor Adams’ office referred questions about the so-called “How Many Stops” bill to the NYPD.
Bratton, a two-time police commissioner, called the bill the worst form of micro-management that will worsen, rather than improve, NYPD-community relations by forcing cops to ask citizens personal information such as race, name and age for non-criminal encounters.
“This is a phenomenal overreach into the operations of the NYPD. It’s overkill,” Bratton said.
“It’s going to discourage police officers from being police officers,” he added.
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams is leading the charge for the bill, which has 32-co-sponsors — including Council Speaker Adrienne Adams (D-Queens), all but assuring its passage.
He did not immediately return requests for comment, but said at a recent hearing for the legislation that he hoped that data obtained by keeping such records would give a “fuller picture” on if NYPD interactions have a racial bias.
“The NYPD has disproportionately frisked and used force against black and Latinx,
Latino people. As we have seen all too often, these stops can escalate quickly to violent or even deadly situations,” he said. “We still, however, do not have the full picture of who is being stopped by the NYPD as they are not currently required to report on Level 1 and Level 2 stops.”
But members of the moderate wing of the council — The Common Sense Caucus co-chaired by Republican Minority Leader Joe Borelli and Queens Democratic Councilman Robert Holden — panned the measure and will vote against it.
“Our police force is stretched thin and already faces more scrutiny and oversight than any agency in the country. It’s ironic that Public Advocate Williams, living in a heavily guarded army base, pushes a bill that will hamstring our police. This legislation, as written, is not only unwarranted but detrimental to public safety,” they said.