Meet Your Mayor
Answer the questions below to see which candidates for NYC mayor agree with you most
Welcome to Meet Your Mayor, which shows you how the candidates’ stands fit with your take on the issues that matter most to New Yorkers.
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Answer the following four questions on the NYPD to see which candidates for mayor most closely match the future you want to see for New York City.
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A key demand of the protests that followed the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis is scaling back the presence of cops in communities. NYC’s current mayor has committed to removing unarmed NYPD agents from school patrols but the armed uniformed police force remains at nearly 35,000.
Question 1 of 4
"I'm calling for a $1.3 billion immediate cut to the NYPD budget that would first be taken by reduction in uniformed officers."
from THE CITY Interview, April 30, 2021
"We need to dramatically reduce their role.... We need to reimagine the way we respond to violence well beyond policing."
from Central Brooklyn Political Action Association forum, Nov. 18, 2020
"I've called for the creation of what we're calling community first responders, units, departments that would actually be staffed with trained personnel who are able to not just provide safe interventions but also access to resources for the community."
from THE CITY interview, Oct. 1, 2020
"I’m really out here leading the way on Abolishing the Police... thank me later !"
from Twitter, Feb. 8, 2021
"Breaking down structural racism in New York City will require long-term, lasting change — and that must include reducing the NYPD’s budget."
from NYC Comptroller's office, June 5, 2020
"Defund the police; what exactly does that mean? In short, it means reallocating police department funding so that our communities are better set up for success. For me, it also means that it is time to re-imagine our policing concept."
from Bklyner, July 16, 2021
"We have to put the 'public' back in public safety. And that means a soup-to-nuts, top-to-bottom restructuring of what we call the New York City Police Department."
from Central Brooklyn Political Action Association forum, Nov. 18, 2020
"The city is facing a budgetary crisis that's going to catch up with this very soon. Therefore, what I've called for are 10% cuts in each in the budget of each city agency, and that includes the NYPD."
from THE CITY Interview, April 29, 2021
"I do not agree with 'defund the police'.... I do agree with community policing and rethinking and reforming the police department."
from Central Brooklyn Political Action Association forum, Nov. 18, 2020
"I am not for ‘defund.’ I'm for restructuring, having better policing, not fewer police."
from Brian Lehrer Show, WNYC, Dec. 2, 2020
"Crime is at an all-time high in terms of what we've seen recently. We've got to save our city.... You restore the money that was taken away, the billion dollars in the budget."
from Newsmax, Feb. 23, 2021
“We have to do everything in our power to make sure that people feel safe walking around our neighborhoods, with our families. And so we have to take the resources that are being deployed on the police department and make sure they're actually making us safer. And also that officers are conducting themselves in a way that's responsible and professional and accountable.”
from THE CITY interview, May 8, 2021
"I would add thousands more cops to the police force. I believe that we should have minimally two cops in each subway station, 24 hours, seven days a week."
from Decision NYC With Ben Max, MNN, March 2, 2021
Eric Adams, Isaac Wright Jr.
In recent years, 15 New Yorkers experiencing mental health crises have died in encounters with NYPD officers. NYC’s current mayor has committed to send out mental health teams without cops a two-precinct test. Some advocates and candidates want to go further.
Question 2 of 4
"I will never put a city employee, psychiatrist, family members or anyone else in a situation that could endanger the lives of innocent people or the person who's going through a mental health crisis.... So no, I will not just openly state, ‘Under no circumstances should a police officer respond.’"
from Citizen Action mental health town hall, Dec. 15, 2020
“We have to completely transform the way we respond with an alternative 911 that ensures that we're sending out trained professionals.”
from Community Voices Heard forum, Feb. 26, 2021
“When someone calls 911 for those cases, the responding personnel should be equipped to deal with the situation effectively and nonviolently. The NYPD’s emergency response teams, therefore, have to include social-service workers”
"Another data-driven approach is to scale up other organizations to respond to emergency calls instead of the police."
from Medium, June 8, 2020
"We need to train more police on how to deescalate conflicts, how to help people, but also reserve the ability to respond for everyone's safety when absolutely necessary."
from THE CITY Interview, April 29, 2021
“We should have nurses or someone else who have degrees in psychology participate with police, but they need to do it hand in hand in partnership.”
from The Brian Lehrer Show, WNYC, Nov. 25, 2020
"I agree with some of the critics of the police department: Cops don't want to be social workers, don't want to have to deal with mental health care problems. You should have special units in each precinct compose the mental health experts who can respond simultaneously with the police when there is an emotionally disturbed person having an episode."
from Decision NYC With Ben Max, MNN, Jan. 27, 2021
Chang calls for a response team modeled after a program in Eugene, Oregon: "unarmed, specifically trained to address these kinds of issues."
from THE CITY Interview, April 30, 2021
"Provide the appropriate interventions and services and supports at the time, in the moment, not sending an armed individual to respond to a mental health crisis."
from Citizen Action mental health town hall, Dec. 17, 2020
"We should have a Love team that focuses on mental health and well-being."
from THE CITY Interview, May 3, 2021
“I support unequivocally moving those responsibilities away from armed officers to mental health professionals and counselors."
from Citizen Action mental health town hall, Dec. 15, 2020
"The role of the police is supposed to be proactive about preventing crime. If you have a mental issue or you're going through something, you haven't committed a crime."
from THE CITY interview , May 12, 2021
“The NYPD is not the appropriate response to people who need mental-health-trained and peer mental health support.”
from Citizen Action mental health town hall, Dec. 15, 2020
Isaac Wright Jr.
More than half of NYPD officers live outside NYC, generating concerns that the uniformed force does not reflect or understand communities it patrols. Some reformers are urging a requirement that cops live within the five boroughs.
Question 3 of 4
Along with imposing residency requiment, Chang would give officers "early retirement incentives."
from THE CITY Interview, April 30, 2021
"We...need a residency requirement so that our police officers reflect the communities they live in."
from Twitter, Jan. 31, 2021
“I will make sure that new cops live in the city. It can't be an 'us versus them' geography.”
from Campaign video, Dec. 10, 2020
“When I grew up, I knew the cops in my neighborhood, and I didn't see them as someone that was there to police me. … I would require that new officers that are coming on to the force should live in the city. You have to be in touch with what's going on in the city.”
from THE CITY interview , May 12, 2021
"You should be of the community, certainly when you start on the force. And that, I believe, would fundamentally change the dynamic, because instead of seeing folks as strangers or potential perpetrators, you see them as your neighbors."
from WNYC, Jan. 26, 2021
"With the salaries they're paid, you can't simply change the rule overnight, and all of a sudden require NYPD officers to up in their lives and move into the city."
from THE CITY Interview, April 29, 2021
"They can't afford to live in New York City, so it doesn't matter where they live. It matters where they came from. It matters what ethnic background they have. It matters where you place them that they can be the most productive."
from Decision NYC With Ben Max, MNN, March 2, 2021
Eric Adams, Dianne Morales, Isaac Wright Jr.
The City Council prompted NYC’s current mayor and police commissioner to create a new “discipline matrix” that sets minimum consequences for cop misconduct. But the commissioner retains the power to override those standards and even misconduct trial decisions, despite calls for outside oversight.
Question 4 of 4
"My police commissioner would be strictly accountable to me on discipline decisions, and I would hire someone I trust to have final authority on that decision."
from POLITICO, Feb. 16, 2021
"As mayor, I will hold the police commissioner accountable for taking appropriate disciplinary actions, and further empower the CCRB to investigate misconduct — including access to body camera footage within 48 hours of request."
from Campaign Facebook page , Feb. 21, 2021
"I will be amending disciplinary power from the NYPD commissioner so that an independent oversight body is able to hold officers accountable for misconduct"
from Streetsblog, Feb. 5, 2021
No candidates selected this answer
"I'm calling for the City Council ratification of the mayoral nomination of a police commissioner, removal of the police chief's sole power over disciplinary matters."
from THE CITY Interview, April 30, 2021
"Hold individual officers responsible for bad acts that too often go unpunished today, including by following the determinations of the Civilian Complaint Review Board and by enforcing a clear, publicly available set of disciplinary standards"
from The Root, Feb. 10, 2021
"That commissioner having 100% authority must change."
from THE CITY Interview, April 29, 2021
"Advance a democratically-elected Civilian Complaint Review Board (CCRB) and empower it to discipline officers."
from Campaign website
"The city should end the police commissioner’s authority to treat CCRB investigations and recommendations as advisory — and instead grant the CCRB power to make final disciplinary decisions."
from New York Daily News Op-Ed, Nov. 20, 2020
"You can't have the person you're working with checking the person that’s doing wrong. It just won't work. You need an outside person, an impartial party, looking at it impartially and saying, ‘This is right or wrong’ based upon the parameters that we set as to what's appropriate."
from THE CITY interview , May 12, 2021
Isaac Wright Jr.
Reporting by Ann Choi and Mónica Cordero, development by Will Welch, editing by Alyssa Katz. Candidate images from Ben Fractenberg/THE CITY, Alejandro Durán/THE CITY, Shutterstock and campaign websites.