COMMISH TISCH: On to number four. Mayor Eric Adams is appointing Jessica Tisch, the city’s active sanitation commissioner and longtime public servant, as the fourth person to lead the NYPD during his administration. She will become the second woman to ever helm the nation’s largest police force, after Adams and top city officials clashed with his first police commissioner, Keechant Sewell. His next two picks would go on to have their homes raided by the FBI — one for a recent investigation and the other related to a much older probe.
“Thank you Mayor Adams for the opportunities that you have given me to serve the city that I love and the extraordinary responsibility with which you are entrusting me today,” Tisch said, shortly after receiving a prolonged applause from Adams administration officials. “It has been an honor to serve the people of New York City for the past 17 years and in particular over the past three years under your leadership.” Gov. Kathy Hochul — who has advocated both privately and publicly for Adams to “clean house” after the mayor was indicted on federal charges of corruption — celebrated the move. "Governor Hochul is grateful for the men and women of the NYPD who put their lives on the line to protect us all, and she congratulates Commissioner Tisch on her appointment,” her spokesperson Sam Spokony said. “Commissioner Tisch is a dedicated public servant with a record of accomplishment in City government, and Governor Hochul looks forward to working with her and Mayor Adams on critical public safety issues.”
Both the indictment and shakeup in City Hall has presented Hochul with the opportunity to show leadership as the city’s chief executive is marred by scandal. The governor has the constitutional authority to remove the mayor, but she is unlikely to exercise that power without broad support from other Democratic leaders. Since Adams' indictment and Hochul’s directive to clean house, the city has seen a new schools chancellor, a new first deputy mayor, a new deputy mayor for public safety, a new health commissioner and now two new police commissioners. While both the mayor and the governor said publicly that Hochul never ordered Adams to replace specific City Hall officials, Hochul has taken implicit credit for the new appointments in City Hall. Like the recently-promoted First Deputy Mayor Maria Torres-Springer, Tisch does not come from Adams’ inner circle but is entering an agency that is central to his professional and political identity. Adams retired from the NYPD as a captain nearly 20 years ago to run for office. With a budget of $6.2 billion the NYPD is more resourced than most nations’ armies. It will now be led by the 43-year-old Tisch, a three-time Harvard grad who has never put on a cop’s uniform but served the NYPD in a civilian role for more than a decade. The public service veteran comes from a billionaire family that has played a hand in New York politics for decades. Tisch’s mother Merryl Tisch is the former chancellor of the New York State Board of Regents and chairs the board of trustees of the State University of New York. Her father, a GOP donor, once backed a Republican bid for mayor while her mother supported a Democrat. Her appointment comes exactly two months after interim police commissioner Tom Donlon saw his home raided as part of a probe that involved classified documents he had obtained over 20 years ago. During his announcement of Tisch as commissioner, Adams thanked Donlon for his service and said he will ask Donlon to work under Chauncey Parker, the new Deputy Mayor for Public Safety. “I asked him could he come in at the time and stabilize the agency that I love so much, and he agreed to do so,” Adams said of Donlon. “He agreed to come out of his comfortable setting and enter this very loud arena, and I cannot thank him enough.” — Jason Beeferman — REQUIRED READING: Jessica Tisch, the ex-NYPD official trying to tame New York’s trash (The New Yorker)
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