Talk

Online Book Discussion: ‘The Last Neighborhood Cops: The Rise and Fall of Community Policing in New York Public Housing’ Pt. II

The Last Neighborhood Cops is a history of the New York City Housing Authority Police Department (HAPD), an autonomous police force which was established in 1952 until it was merged with the NYPD in 1995 under the Giuliani administration. A rare instance of community policing in practice, The Last Neighborhood Cops takes a look at the conflicts which would arise between NYCHA tenants and broader urban trends during a period which saw the rise of neoconservative policy in a city often believed to be a liberal redoubt, and the "punitive turn"  in the nation's system of criminal justice. The author is Greg "Fritz" Umbach, assistant Professor of History at John Jay College.