The department’s reputation and notoriety have been the byproducts of two things: the danger of life on the city’s streets in the 1970s, ’80s, and early ’90s — and the department’s successful campaign to usher in an unprecedented turnaround for public safety.
In just a single generation, New York went from several years of more than 2,000 murders a year down to fewer than 300.
Popular though it may still be, the NYPD has also had its struggles — with rising crime and disorder, with officer retention and morale, and with its ongoing quest to build and maintain public trust in minority communities.
These are the persistent issues — not rare, headline-grabbing targeted assassinations — that will shape Commissioner Tisch’s tenure and ultimately define her success.
Previous NYPD commissioners had, through the 1990s and 2000s, been judged primarily on hard and fast measures of crime.
But Commissioner Tisch will have to navigate the politics of a police force hampered by obstacles that include decarcerationist district attorneys, as well as state and city-level reforms that have made — and will continue to make — it easier for even dangerous criminals to roam the streets freely.
The job of the top cop can no longer be judged simply on the basis of whether the major crime categories traditionally tracked by the department rise or fall, but also on the public’s perception of order and safety on city streets.
Tisch faces a daunting task, but her impressive and unconventional resume suggests she may very well be what the NYPD needs.
Tisch holds three degrees from Harvard, including a JD and MBA, and accrued nearly two decades of distinguished public service in New York City.
Her service, however, has been done as a civilian, which makes her the first NYPD commissioner in generations not to have previously been a law enforcement officer.
However, Commissioner Tisch brings to this role her experience as an attorney and an executive within city government who has led both the sanitation department and the city’s department of technology, information, and telecommunications.
One question she seems especially well-suited to answer is how new force-multiplier technologies — like AI, facial recognition, drones, and risk assessment tools — might be leveraged to help the department do more with less, given recent struggles with officer recruitment and retention.
We are keen to see how Tisch embraces such realms.
We’re also keen to see how the commissioner manages what is perhaps the city’s most politically visible role outside of City Hall at a time in which the department is under intense (and often bad-faith) scrutiny from activists and politicians who’ve built their brands around commitments to opposing the NYPD whenever possible.
The NYPD has been in an ongoing p.r. war since Bill de Blasio launched his campaign for mayor over a decade ago.
Onlookers will pay close attention to how Tisch balances the tasks of stabilizing a department that is on its fourth chief executive in less than three years, building a rapport with the more than 30,000 rank-and-file officers under her, defending the institution from its many political enemies, and recapturing some of the ground lost during the post-Ferguson p.r. war.
Others will be watching to see whether Mayor Adams distances himself from his reputation as an activist within the department that was once his professional home.
These are, as they say, interesting times for the NYPD. Despite recent declines in homicides and shootings, anxiety about public safety remains high — and not without reason.
The recent triple homicide committed by a mentally ill man with a lengthy criminal history who rampaged through lower Manhattan hasn’t helped.
And though the department is among the most elite in the world with regard to just about every aspect of policing, there remains a well-funded activist class waiting in the wings to seize on any misstep in order to knock the NYPD down a peg.
From rising mundane disorder to splashy assassinations, Jessica Tisch faces a big job. All indications are that Tisch has what it takes to do it well.
All that is left is to selfishly wish her luck.
Why is that selfish? Because the last few years have made clear that the fate of the department is intertwined with that of the city.
Without public order, New York simply can’t thrive. And if there’s one thing we should have learned by now, it’s that public order doesn’t just happen — especially not without a functioning and trusted NYPD.
William J. Bratton is a former commissioner of the NYPD. Rafael A. Mangual is the Nick Ohnell Fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal, from which this piece was adapted.