#Protesters can take residence outside City Hall on one condition

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Donated supplies line the outside of the protest camp.
Stephen Yang

Protesters who have taken up residence outside City Hall to call for a $1 billion cut to NYPD funding are free to stay, so long as they don’t set up any structures, a department chief told the throngs on Wednesday.

Assistant Chief Stephen Hughes of Patrol Borough Manhattan South surveyed the scene outside City Hall Park on Wednesday afternoon with about 10 fellow Finest, directing the demonstrators to take down a makeshift medical tent they’d erected.

The activists complied, with no sign of aggression from either them or the police.

“We want to protect the people’s right to protest. It’s the First Amendment,” Hughes told reporters at the scene. “It’s public space. … We just ask about the structures. That’s the issue.”

About 200 protesters were spotted in and around the area Wednesday afternoon, roughly double the 100 who settled in Tuesday night.

Organizers have said they intend to hold the space until at least June 30, the day before the budget for the city’s upcoming fiscal year is due.

Spurred by the death last month of George Floyd — a black man killed when a white Minneapolis cop kneeled on his neck during an arrest — the protesters are amplifying calls for a cut of at least $1 billion to the NYPD’s $6 billion budget.

City Council Speaker Corey Johnson and seven other council members have embraced the “Defund the police” movement, joining the push for a $1 billion reduction.

After initial resistance to any cuts, Mayor Bill de Blasio has vowed to reallocate an unspecified amount of funding from the department to various community and youth groups starting with the upcoming city budget, a plan endorsed by NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea.

Hizzoner and NYPD brass, however, have voiced strong opposition to a 10-figure cut.

If the budget fails to include a shift of at least $1 billion from the NYPD to community-based causes, protest organizer Jawanza James Williams said, the demonstrators are prepared to dig in.

“We’ll stay here as long as it takes,” Williams, director of organizing for VOCAL-NY, said Wednesday. “The people that can actually defund the police are negotiating the budget this week.

“And you know where they are? They’re right there in City Hall.”

The contingent that has brought their grievance to the shadow of City Hall appeared Wednesday to be in for the long haul, with or without structures.

By the afternoon, they had assembled a cache of dozens of containers of Dunkin’ Donuts coffee, bottled water and snacks including nuts, Pop-Tarts, pretzels and fresh fruit.

There were also umbrella stations, the first seedlings of an herb garden and, in a sign of the times, ample supplies of hand sanitizer and face masks to stem the spread of the coronavirus.