called to slash one-third of <\/a>the Parks Enforcement Patrol\u2019s existing fleet of 350 officers.<\/p>\n\u201cThe current staffing level does not allow PEP officers to properly cover all of NYC parks and leaves significant gaps in coverage,\u201d a council source told The Post.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe fear right now is that there is a gap, and this funding would be to plug that hole.\u201d<\/p>\n
The council is seeking to add some $40 million to the department\u2019s upcoming budget \u2014 with roughly half of the funding going toward effectively quadrupling the number of PEP officers.<\/p>\n
Half of the roles the council is pushing to add would be \u201cone-shot\u201d positions that won\u2019t have guaranteed funding in years to come, the source said.<\/p>\n
Other improvements included in the council\u2019s latest lump sum ask include hiring additional city parks workers and forestry management to tend to tree pruning, stump removal and sidewalk repairs.<\/p>\n
Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s initial budget plan called for slashing one-third of the entire PEP officer fleet. Matthew McDermott for NY Post<\/p>\n
The uniformed PEP officers, who function within the Parks Dept. instead of the NYPD, are tasked with issuing summonses for quality-of-life infractions such as dumping and vandalism across hundreds of parks and playgrounds around the city.<\/p>\n
Nearly\u00a0600 quality-of-life concerns were redirected to PEP officers from 311 in 2025 \u2014 up 164.3% from 2023 and 793.6% from 2022 \u2014 ranging from dogs illegally off-leash, smoking, blocked entrances and unlicensed vending.<\/p>\n
\u201cEvery neighborhood park would be affected,\u201d Adam Ganser, executive director of the New Yorkers for Parks advocacy group, fumed to The Post earlier this month over Mamdani\u2019s plan to slash PEP officers.<\/p>\n
In a Wednesday statement, Ganser called the council pitch to beef up PEP enforcement a \u201csignificant commitment.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhile still not enough to adequately serve all 1,700 parks citywide, it\u2019s a meaningful investment in these workers,\u201d he said, \u201cand [a] show of support for the critical role PEP officers play in keeping parks safe, welcoming, and accessible for all New Yorkers.\u201d<\/p>\n
The uniformed PEP officers, who function within the Parks department instead of the NYPD, are tasked with issuing summonses for quality-of-life infractions. Leonardo Munoz for NY Post<\/p>\n
Some parks with private stewardship funding \u2014 including Central Park \u2014 have gone so far as to hire private officers to tackle mounting issues in recent months.<\/p>\n
The Central Park Conservancy\u2019s Central Park Ranger Corps., which launched last spring, has already doubled in size and addressed roughly 30,000 calls \u2014 ranging from 17,000 off-leash dog reports to 2,000 vendor issues, a rep said.<\/p>\n
But hundreds of other city parks without private funding would be disproportionately neglected under the current budget plan, critics argued.<\/p>\n
The green space with the most total 311 calls last year was Marcus Garvey Park in Harlem, where both NYPD cops and PEP officers responded to 1,708 reports.<\/p>\n
Trailing behind Marcus Garvey Park was Flushing Meadows Corona Park<\/a> with 635 311 calls directed to PEP officers, followed by Prospect Park (309), Fort Tryon Park (291) and Washington Square Park (284).<\/p>\nSeveral Harlem residents previously told The Post the PEP officers stationed throughout the park manage everything from loud music to fighting.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe could really use more of those [officers], not less,\u201d lifelong Harlem resident Joan told The Post earlier this month.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201c[The] biggest problem around here is people killing each other,\u201d the 79-year-old said, \u201cand those Park officers actually help.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"They want to see more green! The City Council is pushing back against Mayor Zohran Mamdani\u2019s cuts to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":245741,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[14927,68,57,9,197,56,63,65,64,10649,14182,25042,58,82],"class_list":["post-245740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-city-budget","tag-exclusive","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city-life","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-parks","tag-parks-department","tag-quality-of-life","tag-us-news","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245740"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245740\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245741"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}