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Janae Pierre: Welcome to NYC Now. I'm Janae Pierre. The NYPD's Strategic Response Group is a unit that has long been criticized for how it handles protests in the city. In a campaign promise, Zohran Mamdani said he'd get rid of it, but where does that stand now? We'll get into that soon, but first, here's a couple news headlines.

Governor Kathy Hochul is tapping former New York City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams as her running mate. It's a historic move, forming the first women-led ticket for a major party. The Democratic governor says Adams will be a strong voice helping her stand up to President Trump. Hochul's reelection campaign announced a ticket on the eve of the Democratic convention in Syracuse. Both women are moderates. Hochul is a white woman from Buffalo, and Adams is a Black woman from southeast Queens.

The governor's Democratic primary challenger, Antonio Delgado named India Walton as his running mate. Republican candidate Bruce Blakeman is still vetting possible partners. Mayor Mamdani's administration is promoting a free tax filing program for New Yorkers. As tax day gets closer, he says nearly half of New Yorkers are eligible, specifically families who made up to $97,000 last year, and single filers who made up to $68,000.

Zohran Mamdani: For so many New Yorkers, a feeling of nagging dread begins to intensify as the April 15 deadline nears. Even now in early February, I know that that pressure is beginning to mount.

Janae Pierre: The mayor says the program saved New Yorkers more than $38 million last year. There are more than 140 locations across the city that can help residents with their tax needs year round for free. New Yorkers who qualify for the program, and want to get a jump on their taxes can learn more at nyc.gov/taxprep.

A beloved comic book store in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, is closing after nearly 20 years. Galaxy Comics opened back in 2007, but the owners say the store will close on March 1st. However, the Park Slope location of Galaxy Comics remains open, so check that one out if you're interested.

Up next, we take a look at the controversial NYPD unit that Mamdani says he'd like to disband. That's after a quick break.

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During his mayoral campaign, Zohran Mamdani made a very specific promise about how protests should be policed in New York City. He said he wanted to disband the NYPD's Strategic Response Group. That's a unit that has long been criticized for how it handles demonstrations.

Zohran Mamdani: There is a need to ensure that every act we take is one that is actually delivering public safety, and what we see right now, especially with regards to how we respond to protests, is not a binding.

Janae Pierre: Now, Mamdani is mayor, and he says he's still committed to dismantling that unit. The Strategic Response Group has continued to be deployed, including at recent anti-ICE protests where arrests were made.

Zohran Mamdani: We know that until we deliver this in an operational manner, that the SRG will continue to be used, and that is why we are hard at work to resolving this issue.

Janae Pierre: Today, we're going to slow down a bit, and answer some questions, like what this unit actually is, why it's controversial, and why, at least for the moment, this group is still on the streets? WNYC and Gothamist reporter Ben Feuerherd has been covering this, and to help better understand how this unit has evolved over the years, Ben spoke to a former NYPD deputy inspector who helped create the unit more than a decade ago. Ben, tell me, what is the NYPD Strategic Response Group, and why was it created in the first place?

Ben Feuerherd: The former deputy inspector, who I talked to, this guy, Anthony Raganella, he walked us through the genesis of it. He said it was pulled together eventually in 2015, at first, in response to a number of high profile mass shootings and terror attacks across the country. He said the idea for it was to have this police unit that would supplement other units that already existed in the NYPD that could respond to something like a mass shooting, in case the other units are tapped out.

Meaning, if there was a mass shooting in the city, and the emergency services unit didn't have enough officers to respond, the Strategic Response Group would also be trained to respond to something like a mass casualty event. At the same time, it was also designed to police peaceful protests to what he said, "Facilitate First Amendment activity in the city," is how the police phrased it. To Raganella, it like created this inherent conflict to him. Like, on one hand you have officers who are trained in to carry heavy weapons, and on the other hand, you had the same officers ready to respond to protests.

Anthony Raganella: When we initially put up the idea of the Strategic Response Group, I personally did not want the Strategic Response Group to have heavy weapons, and I did not like the idea of crossing over, having a unit that carried heavy weapons, but then was also responsible for facilitating First Amendment assemblies. I just thought that there was an inherent conflict in that approach and that optic, and we pushed back on the idea of the heavy weapons, but it got overruled.

Janae Pierre: Just seeing heavy weapons at a peaceful protest, can rub people the wrong way, right?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, and it's important to note, it was never the intent that they would actually carry these weapons at protests, but that was the initial questions that everybody had in the city. Like, "Okay, these people are trained to carry machine guns, essentially. Are they going to be at protests with them?" The answer is, no, but that wasn't communicated clearly, I think, to the public, and people's first reaction was, "This is a strange dichotomy here."

Anthony Raganella: We never set out to say that we're going to carry heavy weapons at a protest. That was never on the table, but the public didn't understand that, because they just heard this is a public order unit that's going to respond to protests, but wait a minute, they're going to carry heavy weapons also? Because the education to the public wasn't done, the public misunderstood it as, they're going to be at protests with heavy weapons, and that was never the idea.

Janae Pierre: This was during that time when people were talking about the militarization of police, right?

Ben Feuerherd: Certainly. I mean, and that conversation exists today.

Janae Pierre: Yes. I want to go back to what you said, that this group was put together in 2015, and I'm thinking about all the unrest that happened during that time. Of course, there was the police killing of Freddie Gray in Baltimore, Eric Garner right here in New York City. Then, also the Mayday protests here in New York City. A lot going on, so you're telling me that this group was created in response to all of this?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, so certainly, but also, it just came at a time where the country and the city was at a fever pitch in terms of policing these really high profile police killings, and people responding to all that in huge number. Raganella told me that these issues that have been raised about SRG, these problems are not unique to the NYPD, that these issues exist across the country, and he even said that he traveled to Europe to better understand how police departments like the Metropolitan Department in London, actually police protest, police free speech.

Janae Pierre: What did he find?

Ben Feuerherd: He thought that we were well behind Europe [chuckles] at the time.

Janae Pierre: All right. Let's talk about when the shift happened with this unit, because it has become especially associated with policing protests. Why has that drawn so much criticism?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, so I think it's what you mentioned before that, it was formed at this moment in the city, and also around the country where protests just exploded in response, specifically, to police killings of people of color, and then it all culminated in 2020, where you had some protesters destroyed property in the city, like burning cop cars.

Janae Pierre: That's after the killing of George Floyd?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, exactly. Then, also, at the same time, there's real criticism about how NYPD officers responded to those peaceful demonstrations, but also the more violent demonstrations that happened, or destructive rather. Then, eventually, so after all that, the department faced a whole host of lawsuits over their response about how they assaulted protesters and things like that.

Then, to settle all These claims in 2023, the department agreed to make changes on how they police protest, and part of that was, they agreed to limit how SRG could be deployed at them. It was a big victory for civil rights groups, for the NYCLU, who they called SRG notorious in their announcement of the settlement.

Janae Pierre: What were Raganella's thoughts about those changes that were implemented?

Ben Feuerherd: He raised the response to 2020, basically, his whole thesis about SRG was that the training that the officers received when it was first formed was not sufficient. He and others who devised the unit essentially, originally, put forth this idea that they would be trained in a 11-week academy, and then by the time it was time to get it off the ground, that was whittled down to two weeks.

Anthony Raganella: The powers that be, they were in such a rush to get this unit up and running, they whittled it down to two weeks of training, and one of those two weeks, an entire week was going to be dedicated to handling of heavy weapons, so the whole notion of having this vision that I had of a credible, specialized unit got whittled down to two weeks, and half of it was dedicated to special weapons training. Needless to say, we got what we paid for.

Ben Feuerherd: I just want to note that an NYPD spokesperson, Brad Weekes, he pushed back on this notion that officers assigned to SRG were not sufficiently trained. Weekes says, "SRG officers go through a seven-week initial training that covers topics such as crowd control, First Amendment rights and arrest tactics," and then he also said, "In addition, officers complete monthly refresher courses on all those topics."

Janae Pierre: This conversation comes back up after recent arrests at anti-ICE protests in Lower Manhattan. What role did SRG play in those arrests?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, in the last week of January, there was a pretty significant anti-ICE protests in Lower Manhattan, as there have been for months now. This one just focused on a hotel that protesters thought was being used by DHS, or maybe ICE agents were staying there, and the protesters ended up occupying the lobby of this hotel that's near Canal Street, and they didn't leave.

An NYPD spokesperson says police were there telling them to get out of the hotel for 45 minutes, and eventually officers arrested more than 60 people, including officers from the Strategic Response Group, and among the protesters arrested was Dante de Blasio, the former mayor's son.

Janae Pierre: Former Mayor de Blasio. This recent anti-ICE protest that happened in Lower Manhattan, this is actually the first time that SRG has been out since Mayor Mamdani has been in office, right?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, so it's certainly the first newsworthy or high profile-- I don't know if they've been out at other demonstrations, but this one definitely caught the eye. The mayor responded to it at a press conference.

Zohran Mamdani: The NYPD continues to respond to protests as is their responsibility, and we have also emphasized the need for all of those responses, as always, to be ones that respect New Yorkers exercising a First Amendment activity. I think that to add, that I also commend New Yorkers who exercise their constitutional right to protest, especially in bringing attention to the horrific abuses of ICE across this country, and I think, especially right now in Minneapolis.

Janae Pierre: Why is the unit still being used in the first place?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, so he actually talked about that at that press conference, and he said, "I'm working with the police commissioner." He said, "I've had conversations with her about-- I'm committed to doing this."

Zohran Mamdani: I believe that we should do so not on the basis of any fiscal need, but frankly on the need to decouple the counterterrorism responsibilities within the department from police response to First Amendment exercise.

Ben Feuerherd: I asked Raganella where does he come down on that? Does he see eye-to-eye with Mamdani? He said that it's ironic that he, the typical longtime law enforcement NYPD officer, has some common ground with Mamdani, the Democratic Socialist, who obviously faced lots of criticism during the campaign about statements he made about the NYPD, and who actually had to formally apologize to members of the NYPD over statements he's made.

Anthony: It makes me wonder if he may have somehow heard about the work that myself and my colleagues are doing to bring attention to this, because it's right in line with what we've been talking about. I'm hopeful that it will result in what we initially wanted for the SRG back in 2014 when we were trying to figure out what it was going to look like. If we could get back to having that, I would be ecstatic about it.

Janae Pierre: Raganella believes that this group is necessary, but could use some revisions.

Ben Feuerherd: Yes, and he said he's cautiously optimistic. That's what he said about Mamdani taking this seriously, and he worries, as I'm sure other people do, that the department could just disband it, create something with a new name that, for all intents and purposes, is the exact same thing, but he is hopeful that they don't do that, that they actually-- Maybe they separate the powers of responding to terrorism and responding to protests, which Mamdani said that at the press conference, that his core ideological problem with them is that they're trained to respond to things like terrorism while also trying to respond to things like protests, which, as he said, just creates this inherent conflict.

Janae Pierre: Do you need this group, or can police just do their jobs? You talked about the resurgence of all these lawsuits and everything after the killing of George Floyd, when all of these protests were going on nationwide, it was like every cop was needed, and this was also during a time where we had Black Lives Matter versus Blue Lives Matter, right? It's like, why not give the entire department this type of training?

Ben Feuerherd: Yes. There's certainly a case to be made that police should be out there, but also to what extent, and what does that look like? That's the question that all these competing forces have, like the civil liberties groups, the police officers, the executives in the PD, and also the mayor. As we've seen over the past five years, demonstrations, protests pop up everywhere all over the city.

Janae Pierre: Everywhere, every day. [chuckles] That's WNYC's Ben Feuerherd. Ben, thanks a lot.

Ben Feuerherd: Thanks.

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