#Protesters plan to camp out near City Hall till NYPD budget is cut
“#Protesters plan to camp out near City Hall till NYPD budget is cut”
June 24, 2020 | 12:26am | Updated June 24, 2020 | 12:40am
Organizers with the groups VOCAL-NY and New York Communities for Change said they are ready to camp out through June 30, the day before the City Council’s deadline to approve the 2021 fiscal year budget.
“The occupation is planning on staying here until June 30th, calling for at least $1 billion [in cuts] and to reinvest the money into communities,” said VOCAL-NY director of organizing Jawanza Williams in a statement to The Post.
“If the cuts aren’t included in the budget, there is no telling what the masses of people who have been mobilized by this movement will do.”
About 100 anti-cop protesters occupied a grassy area outside City Hall Park, off of Center Street, at around 10 p.m. on Tuesday night, equipped with water, hand sanitizer and some hammocks.
They passed out pizzas, played music and a handful of people broke into an experimental dance at one point.
Some put out calls on social media asking for more supplies, including blankets, sleeping bags and food. Organizers also asked nearby businesses and places of worship to allow protesters to use their restrooms.
The aim is to make “a major visual demand before the budget ends on the 30th,” said Celina Trowell, a 33-year-old organizer from Brooklyn.
“We wanted to get out there collectively and say this is a peoples’ demand not just to defund the police, but to reinvest in communities that have been historically disinvested,” Trowell said.
She added: “One reason we say defund is we’re saying pull away from capitalism. That’s one of the ways police brutality has survived and maintained.”
New York City activists — fueled by the police-involved killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis — have been demanding the $1 billion slash to the NYPD coffers in recent weeks.
It would be the first time in at least two decades that the NYPD’s budget has faced cuts.
The NYPD had a $5.6 billion operating budget this fiscal year. The City Council had indicated earlier this year that it expected to set aside the same amount in 2021.
But Speaker Corey Johnson and seven other City Council leaders firmly embraced the “Defund Police” movement this month, calling for the $1 billion in cuts.
Both Mayor Bill de Blasio and First Deputy Police Commissioner Benjamin Tucker have rejected the figure as too high.
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