Police Commissioner Jessica S. Tisch on Tuesday unveiled sweeping changes to department operations during her 2026 State of the NYPD address, building on a year that saw the fewest shooting incidents and victims in recorded history.
Among the most significant announcements was a major restructuring in the Bronx, which will be divided into two patrol borough commands for the first time.
The change, set to take effect in the spring, will bring nearly 200 additional officers to the Bronx and add to it specialized units, including homicide squad detectives, evidence collection teams, narcotics units, Neighborhood Safety Teams and auto crime units.
The Bronx currently operates under a single patrol borough command, while Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens each have two. Last year, the Bronx accounted for more than one-third of all shooting incidents and shooting victims citywide — roughly three times the total in Queens and three times the total in Manhattan.
The borough also recorded more major crimes than Manhattan and Queens and nearly as many as Brooklyn, while generating close to 1 million calls for service.
“Together, we have cleared away the rubble of crisis, and we say with renewed certainty that the state of the NYPD is strong,” Tisch said. She added that 2025 focused on keeping promises and exceeding expectations, a commitment she said would remain unchanged in 2026.
Department wide, the NYPD will launch what Tisch described as its most significant overhaul of in-service training in decades. Officers will take part in recurring, weeklong training programs throughout their careers, covering tactics, de-escalation, constitutional policing, legal standards and situational awareness.
The department is also modernizing its operations with new technology. A digital dispatch system will be rolled out for 311 jobs assigned to Q-Teams, allowing officers to track, respond to and close calls using the same structure as 911 assignments.
In addition, the NYPD will transition to digital precinct command logs, replacing handwritten paper logbooks that have been used since 1845.
An upgraded Domain Awareness System will bring real-time information directly to officers in the field. The original platform, launched in 2014, provided centralized access to data for patrol responses and investigations.
The updated version will alert officers to stolen vehicles detected by license plate readers ahead of them and allow supervisors to view live drone video at incident scenes.
Tisch said the department expects to receive drone mitigation authority from the White House later this year and is investing millions of dollars in equipment and training. While the NYPD can currently detect drones, it does not have authority to disable them.
The preparations are aimed at ensuring readiness for major upcoming events, including the World Cup, the nation’s 250th anniversary and the 25th anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.
In other announcements, Cardinal Timothy Dolan and the Rev. A.R. Bernard were named co-chief chaplains of the NYPD to oversee the Chaplains Unit.
Dolan led the Archdiocese of New York for nearly two decades, while Bernard founded the Christian Cultural Center, one of the city’s largest congregations. They will be installed during a ceremony Feb. 24.
The NYPD Police Academy will also be named in honor of Det. Steven D. McDonald, who was shot and paralyzed in the line of duty on July 12, 1986. McDonald died Jan. 10, 2017. An official naming ceremony is scheduled for July 16, 2026 — 42 years to the day he entered the Police Academy.
Tisch also highlighted overall crime reductions, noting that major crime declined in all five boroughs last year and that the subway system recorded its lowest index crime totals since 2009, excluding pandemic years.