NYC Council Speaker Not Saying If She’ll Back Traffic Crash Investigation Reform
New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn is remaining mum on whether she’ll back legislation to reform the way the NYPD investigates traffic crashes.
“As with all legislation on the day that it’s introduced,” said Quinn, “it will be referred to committee, I will review it, and it’ll make its way through the legislative process.”
Several New York City Council members have introduced a package of legislation that would broaden the number of crashes the New York Police Department investigates.
Current NYPD policy is to investigate traffic crashes only if the victim is dead or has suffered a life-threatening injury. And only members of the 19-member collision Investigation Squad can conduct those inquiries.
Some 243 people were killed in traffic crashes in 2011. A TN investigation found that in “all cases where a driver kills someone — pedestrian, cyclist, other motorists, themselves — forty percent of the time, there’s not even a traffic ticket.”
Council Member Brad Lander, who’s co-sponsoring ‘The Crash Investigation Reform Act,’ says too few officers are dedicated to crash investigation. “We can train a lot more people to do that investigation work who are patrol officers or regular precinct cops,” Lander said.
The bills and resolutions introduced into City Council would also require the NYPD to investigate serious — not just deadly — crashes; create a task force analyzing how crashes are investigated; broaden the NYPD’s crash statistic reporting; and require the NYPD to collect insurance and ID information from drivers who injure cyclists.
These proposed reforms come five months after a bruising City Council hearing where NYPD brass defended the department’s procedures.
“A broad set of people came out of that hearing feeling really troubled,” said Lander. He said that he, Peter Vallone, and Jimmy Vacca — three council members who haven’t always agreed on transportation issues — see eye on eye on this one.
The NYPD did not return a request for comment.