NYC restores funding for long-awaited Queens police precinct
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Mayor Bill de Blasio announced the site of the new 116th Precinct in 2017. Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office
By David Brand
New York City will restore funding for a long-awaited police precinct in Southeast Queens, Mayor Bill de Blasio said Tuesday.
The new 116th Precinct has been in the works for years, with the city finalizing plans for a Rosedale stationhouse in 2017 before freezing funds last year. The city directed a portion of the money to renovate a community center at Roy Wilkins Park.
De Blasio said a stronger fiscal outlook, and a political climate with less focus on the NYPD budget, will allow the city to reinstate the $105 million project .
“I can announce today that we are fully funding the new 116th Precinct building and new community center,” de Blasio said. “These are things that the community has said will improve the quality of life, that will allow the community to get what they need.”
“Literally this fight has been going on for decades,” he added. “And so once, and for all, we'll be able to provide this support to the community in Southeast Queens.”
Community members and local leaders said a new stationhouse is necessary to cut down on response times in the 105th Precinct’s large geographic zone, which includes much of the easternmost portion of mainland Queens, from Glen Oaks and Floral Park in the north to Springfield Gardens and Rosedale in the south. The 105th is the fifth-largest precinct in the city, covering nearly 12.5 square miles and 354 miles of roadway in Southeast Queens.
The new 116th Precinct will take over half of the 105th Precinct’s territory, with the goal of reducing response times in Southeast Queens.
The city cut the cash earmarked for the precinct in last year’s austerity budget, which coincided with a movement to slash funding to the NYPD. De Blasio told reporters Tuesday that the stationhouse was a casualty of the move to reduce the police budget.
“We were going through a horrible situation because of COVID and the ability to invest in communities meant we had to make choices,” he said. “And we did take resources from the NYPD and put them into community needs like youth centers, recreation centers, etc. This 116th Precinct building was something that could not happen in that environment because of those trade-offs.”
Councilmember Selvena Brooks-Powers, recently elected to represent Rosedale and nearby neighborhoods, acknowledged the efforts of individual community members who had advocated for the new precinct since the 1970s.
“This group has spent countless hours fighting for much-needed and deserved equity,” Brooks-Powers said. “It has been a long time coming to this point … but I represent a constituency that knows how to fight.”
Some of those community members formed the 116th Precinct Task Force, which celebrated the latest announcement by de Blasio.
“We thank the Mayor for taking this very timely and critical action that will fill the void in police protection for the communities of Southeast and Northeast Queens and help stem the tide of rising crime,” said Task Force Co-Chair Bess DeBetham.
