New York Metropolis’s Occasions Sq., aptly named “The Crossroads of the World” for greater than 100 years, attracts tons of of hundreds of vacationers, commuters, employees, and theatergoers day-after-day. As a famend vacation spot, it’s anchored by its large subway system, its famed Broadway theaters, and a traditionally sturdy and collaborative personal sector concentrate on public security — a spotlight that I helped to steer first because the New York Metropolis Transit police chief within the early 1990′s and twice as NYPD commissioner in 1994 and once more in 2014.
Occasions Sq. benefitted from a constant decline in crime and dysfunction for nearly thirty years, serving to New York declare the title “America’s Most secure Giant Metropolis.” Our secure and pleasant Occasions Sq. persistently attracted an increasing number of vacationers to Midtown over time and served as a catalyst for the broader Manhattan economic system.
:quality(70)/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/tronc/X6XHF6NFWRGULA4YLIJSFCZWN4.jpg)
Quick ahead to the devastation of the COVID pandemic, which hollowed out industrial places of work, retail institutions and vacationer sights within the Occasions Sq. space. Regardless of the post-pandemic “reopening” of New York, like elsewhere within the metropolis, the native crime price in Occasions Sq. rose shortly with a major decline in public security and an increase in worry — each actual and perceived.
If left unchecked, persistent crime will turn out to be a drain on the neighborhood’s financial vitality. Vacationers and theatergoers will keep away from the realm, which hurts native outlets and eating places. Business workplace employees will resist a return to what they understand to be a probably harmful commute. Broadway employees — from stagehands to actors — will face the potential of random assaults and harassment as they depart their theaters every evening and attempt to stroll or subway residence.
However that is removed from a hopeless scenario. The private and non-private sectors have partnered to make Occasions Sq. secure earlier than, and we will do it once more. With higher safety infrastructure and elevated sources for the homeless, we will make Occasions Sq. safer for everybody — we simply want the monetary and political willpower — and management — to take action.
SL Inexperienced, New York’s largest industrial landlord and a constant presence in Occasions Sq. for many years — is able to put money into and assist coordinate a significant new safety plan for the encircling space and has employed my firm, Teneo, to analyze methods safety may be improved within the space.
SL Inexperienced is partnering with Caesars Leisure on a bid for a brand new gaming license, a part of which might contain a multi-million-dollar personal funding in improved security, safety, and cleanliness for Occasions Sq.. Gaming services by their very nature are excessive safety operations. Operators make investments hundreds of thousands in loss prevention and energetic surveillance to maintain the on line casino, clients, and workers secure. However SL Inexperienced’s proposal for Occasions Sq. goes past routine in-house safety and would make investments over time in extra of $85 million for a brand new public-private security initiative. This funding will make sure the Occasions Sq. space is secure and safe, in every single place for everybody for years to return.
The proposed safety measures would cowl a large space from fortieth St. to 53rd St. between Sixth and Eighth Ave. The funding would come with hundreds of thousands for brand spanking new safety personnel and would come with an expanded safety presence between 9 p.m. and 5 a.m., when theater audiences, vacationers and the native employees who serve them are nonetheless out and about.
Along with new patrols, the safety plan would come with a state-of-the-art safety operations heart, the place educated employees can monitor and direct safety personnel in actual time. Maybe most significantly, the plan would supply very vital and ongoing investments to supply sources and assist — together with everlasting housing — for homeless New Yorkers.
Considerations {that a} on line casino within the Occasions Sq. space would entice extra crime and dysfunction are unfounded. My agency and I beforehand labored with Caesars in Las Vegas and have reviewed the experiences of the present casinos in Yonkers and Queens, which over time and primarily based on our evaluation, don’t seem to have skilled constant or vital crime that may be proven to have been straight associated to the casinos.
Based mostly alone profitable crime discount experiences within the subways and Occasions Sq., I’m assured that SL Inexperienced’s initiative will make the realm secure and safe and preserve it that method. Rising crime in our city areas is just not inevitable. The strategies and know-how exist already to cease crime earlier than it occurs. These strategies simply should be funded and applied. Expanded public-private collaborative partnerships just like the one proposed for Occasions Sq. might be essential in restoring and increasing our pre-pandemic lifestyle.
Bratton is the previous New York Metropolis police commissioner.
