It is understandable that New Yorkers might think they are witnessing something scripted for a grade school playground. In the stubborn showdown between the police and Mayor Bill de Blasio — turned backs,forgiven infractions — many citizens can only watch with sentiments that flow from bemusement to revulsion, if not a mixture of both.
Lisa Dokken was struck when, while running along the water near her home in Battery Park City the other afternoon, she noticed a police officer dawdling near a patrol car smoking a cigar. She has nothing against people taking occasional breaks, but said she thought: “This just does not seem right. You smoke a cigar after you have a big dinner and a cognac.”
Ms. Dokken, 52, a part-time environmental consultant and graduate student, both feels the police generally do a good job and empathizes with those who believe they are unjustly targeted by law enforcement. But she is appalled at what she considers the immaturity shown by the participants in the current showdown, especially the police.
GRAPHIC
How Much Arrests and Tickets in New York City Have Declined
The New York Police Department’s drastic drop in arrests and tickets continued for a second week.
“We pay them to do a job,” she said. “There’s no excuse ever to have a slowdown. As a taxpayer of this community, it irks me.”
A wide assortment of interviews conducted to gauge the temper of the public over the police-mayor strife found people blaming the police, people blaming the mayor, and many on both sides wanting a final act in this ugly play that seems stalled without an obvious ending.
For weeks, rank-and-file officers have shown their fury at Mr. de Blasio because they feel he disrespects them and disparages how they do their job. Thus many turned their backs to him during the funerals for the officers fatally shot in Brooklyn. Crime statistics covering two consecutive weeks have revealed a staggering plunge in arrests and tickets, particularly for low-level offenses and parking violations, as if some crimes had been suddenly wiped off the books.
Many citizens are clearly repulsed by how the police are expressing their anger. They have turned to calling them “infantile” or “sulky children.” Some feel they should be docked pay. Or fired. Others roundly criticize the mayor as the root of the problem.
Delby Angelo Rodriguez, 32, works the carving station at Katz’s Delicatessenon the Lower East Side of Manhattan. He has family and friends on the police force. In his view, the slowdown boils down to good officers doing the wrong thing. “If they perform any less than they’re supposed to, they’re entitled to get fired,” he said. “You’ve got to keep business and personal opinions separate.”
Ivy Zheng, 40, who lives in Queens and helps her husband with his point-of-sale and security-camera equipment business in Chinatown, said, speaking in Mandarin: “We should all support the police. Without the police what would we do — it’s too scary to think about.”
But she finds the slowdown inexcusable. “Aren’t there rules and regulations for your work?” she said. “Should be even more so for police, no?”
Terrance Bell, 49, lives in the Bronx, owns a printing company and is a father of three. His oldest child is a 17-year-old son. Mr. Bell said he considered his son when he thought about the impasse. Both have had run-ins with the police.
Mr. Bell said he was once arrested by an officer who said he had seen him smoking marijuana the day before. His son, he said, was arrested after he swiped his MetroCard and allowed a friend to pass through the same turnstile with him.
Mr. Bell strongly supports police reforms. At the same time, the drop in enforcement infuriates him. “It’s a good thing,” he said. “But it’s not happening for a good reason.”
He added: “As a civilian, who do I have faith in if my mayor has no control over his police commissioner, who has no control over his officers. Who do I trust? Who do I tell my 17-year-old son to trust?”
The police also have firm supporters who are untroubled by their manner of protest.
Michael Urbaez, 31, a carpenter from the Bronx, does not especially like the slowdown but feels the police are warranted in showing their disdain for Mr. de Blasio, whom Mr. Urbaez considers a poor role model.
“I’m all for the cops,” he said. “I understand what they go through in their daily life — my cousin is a cop. Today I see a lot of no respect everywhere. I take the train every day, I see kids with no morals.”
For the perspective of those benefiting from relaxed enforcement, there is Gary Foster. He is 42, and said he supports himself selling untaxed cigarettes in Queensbridge. His past, he said, is marked by multiple arrests. In these respects, he bears a striking resemblance to Eric Garner, the man who died after being put in a police chokehold and whose death has played a pivotal role in the rift between Mr. de Blasio and the police.
“I get harassed more than the people with the guns,” Mr. Foster said.
In recent weeks, though, no officer has exchanged a word with him.
In his view, the police are throwing a huge, unjustified “temper tantrum.”
“It’s good in a way, and it’s bad in a way,” he said.
As for the mayor, Mr. Foster said: “His job is not entirely focused on the N.Y.P.D. He’s got other things in the city to worry about.”
Many New Yorkers are simply exhausted by it all. In a city where headlines can barely be written before new ones crowd them out, a lot of citizens feel the point has been made, enough already.
Jake Dell, 27, an owner of Katz’s, who has noticed less grumbling from customers upset about getting parking tickets slapped on their cars while they grabbed food, suggests some honest dialogue on a full stomach as the solution.
“Let’s do it right here,” Mr. Dell said. “If everyone came in and ate a pastrami sandwich, we’d have no problem.”
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