NYC NOW - Rethinking Public Safety in New York City

Episode Date: May 25, 2026

What does it actually mean to feel safe in New York City? WNYC and Gothamist health reporter reporter Caroline Lewis joins us to talk about her conversation with the city’s first Community Safety Commissioner, Ayesha Delaney-Brumsey, and the new office now tasked with tackling issues like mental health crises, gun violence. Plus, WNYC and Gothamist reporter Liam Quigley Liam Quigley returns with new reporting on the city’s underground tow truck economy, including a Queens operator openly promoting unlicensed towing crews on social media while officials struggle to crack down. —Click here to listen to Liam’s full story on unlicensed tow trucks: https://podcasts.apple.com/au/podcast/special-investigation-how-new-york-city-lost-control/id1681278959?i=1000749236747 Photo: Gothamist illustration/Photo courtesy of City Hall -Got any questions, comments or story ideas? Send us a message at [e-mail] Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

From WNYC, this is NYC Now. I'm Jenae Pierre. Happy Memorial Day. If you've been listening to the podcast for a while, you may have heard an episode on the underground network of unlicensed tow trucks operating across New York City. Well, there's a new development. On today's episode, we look into the owner of a queen's body shop

who recruits illegal tow truck drivers on social media. Now, if you're tired of being broke, watching TV, watching us, in these trucks, and you're not where we are, well, hit us up and we get you there. But before we get into that, what does it mean to feel safe? That's the question that the first ever commissioner of the city's newly minted Office of Community Safety, Aisha Delaney Brumpsy, will be tasked with answering. The office may not be as well resourced as the billion-dollar Department of Community Safety that Mayor Zoramundani originally planned, but it's still tasked with addressing major issues,

like mental health, gun violence, and the role of law enforcement in public safety. WNYC health reporter Caroline Lewis talked with the commissioner about tackling those issues and what she says to those who are skeptical about reducing the role of law enforcement in public safety. Hey, Caroline. Hey, Jenae. That's a pretty tough question to ask, right? What does it mean to feel safe? What does that mean for you?

Yeah, so I think a lot of people think about public. public safety as synonymous with policing and law and order. But this new office is trying to sort of reframe that and go upstream to address some of these issues, but says it's going to address, quote, the root causes of crime and violence. And so obviously that's a pretty ambitious goal. This office will be overseeing other offices already doing work in these areas, such as gun violence, hate crime prevention, and mental health. The role of this office is really to help coordinate the many,

parts of New York City government that already contribute to those factors that drive safety and stability and really do that at the same time that the office will stay focused on executing a few very key operational priorities. One of those priorities is, of course, violence prevention. I asked the commissioner about what the initial strategy for reducing gun violence will look like, and she said the office will really focus its resources on the people and locations that are at the highest risk for on violence, a sort of hyper-targeted approach. Focusing our research in how do we prevent and from cycling back will be a big priority for this office. Of course, some of this work is already happening through violence prevention programs. So we have to see if this office is really

going to be able to boost the effectiveness of those existing programs or expand on that work in sort of a meaningful way. Yeah, and it's coming at a really important time, right? I can think summertime is always when, for lack of a better word, the block is hot. So, We know that gun violence tends to increase, you know, with the warmer weather. Does the commissioner have some strategies to prevent violence among young people during the summer? Yeah, so I did ask her about this, and she acknowledged, you know, first, that it's been a challenging few weeks. We've seen multiple teens across the city either killed or critically injured in shootings. And it's interesting.

My colleague Brittany Kriegstein has reported that even though we're currently seeing historically low levels of violent crime, the number of minors suspected of being involved in shootings has actually been on the rise over the past few years. Yeah, it's really heartbreaking. Yeah, it is. And the commissioner talked about ways that her office could coordinate among other programs and agencies to strengthen violence prevention programs, you know, especially during the summer. She said that could involve doing outreach among agencies to see who could provide extra wraparound services. You know, who can do extra after-school programming, who can provide extra mental health services,

is sort of making sure that these programs have all the things that they need. Yeah. I want to talk a bit about the commissioner's previous job. She used to oversee BeHeard, which Mayor Mumdani has called for expanding, right? Yeah. So she had a role at NYC Health and Hospitals overseeing Be Heard. For those who are unfamiliar, BeHeard is a pilot program that sends teams of social workers and EMTs to mental health-related 911 calls instead of the police.

but it doesn't cover the entire city yet, and it is somewhat limited in the types of calls these teams can take. So expanding this program is really a key part of Mayor Mom Donnie's platform. You know, he said that he wants to reduce the role of police in responding to these calls. And the commissioner says there are a number of things she'll be looking at when she's looking at trying to strengthen it. I ask for some specifics because there have already been a bunch of proposals out there. Former Mayor Adams said he wanted to cut out the EMTs because there was a staffing shortage. which the EMT union actually resisted. Some mental health advocates have said they want to add peers who have their own experiences with mental health to the program

and to make it accessible through the crisis line 980 rather than requiring people to call 911 and risk getting police. But the commissioner sort of deferred on those specific questions and said it was too soon in her tenure to comment on particular reforms. Yeah, too soon the comment. But I do have a question, like part of what's on this commissioner's plate is, figuring out what role the NYPD should still play in responding to things like mental health crisis. Did you ask her anything about that? Yeah. So she said she understands people who are skeptical about reducing the role of police, but said that she felt that the existence of be heard, you know, so far without incident really has proven that they can take police out of the equation sometimes.

But she said police are crucial to public safety, but too often they're responding when they don't need to be. And so the commissioner said it's incumbent on the city to build. out the resources to allow police officers to respond less frequently. But she also said there will still be instances when police have to be involved because a situation might be violent or risky. What do you make of that? Honestly, you know, I don't think that message is too different from what we've heard from the last couple of mayoral administrations. I think the real question is, where is that line when police have to get involved? And are we going to see that line move? We also have to see how much buy-in the Office of Community Safety is able to get from the

NYPD. I know that until now, police commissioner Tish hasn't really supported the idea that police should be too much less involved in these calls. So we have to see, you know, if that'll change. Do you know if the commissioner has talked to Tish? At the time we spoke, she had been on the job about a day and said she didn't have a chance to yet, but who knows, maybe that's changed. Yeah, maybe. That's WMYC's Caroline Lewis. Thanks a lot, Caroline. Thanks a lot, Caroline. Thanks, Jane. Up next, inside New York City's underground tow truck economy. And the question. Queen's operator using social media to promote it. That's after a quick break.

Earlier this year, Gotham has uncovered a massive underground network of unlicensed tow trucks operating across New York City. Now, that same investigation has a new development. The reporting centers on David Borokoff, a Queen's body shop owner tied to the city's crash-chasing economy. His towing license had already lapsed, and he's been openly recruiting new drivers on social media, while city officials struggle to shut them down. Now, if you're tired of being broke, watching TV, watching us in these trucks, and you're not

where we are, we'll hit us up and we get you there. WMYC and Gothamist reporter Liam Quigley has been following the story. Hey, Liam. Hey, how are you? I'm doing pretty good. So for folks who missed that investigation, remind us of how this industry works and what you've been finding. Yeah, the same way you go to a shop to buy a bottle of wine, that shot.

is supposed to be licensed. Toe trucks need to be licensed the same way in New York City if they want to tow cars to make money. What we figured out is that hundreds of them are not licensed at all. And that's been a growing issue since around 2021. You can find more and more tow trucks that are just out there on New York City streets without any license from the city to operate. And a lot of times they're working in plain view of the police.

And I mentioned that your new reporting centers, on one guy in particular. Tell me about David Boracoff and how he fits into all of this. David is kind of the poster child for all the rough and risky parts of the New York City towing industry.

In his telling of his story, he got started as a chaser when he was 18. That's somebody who races to the scenes of crashes by illegally listening to police radio feeds. And now he's running his own body shop and he has a fleet of his own unlicensed tow trucks, and he's actually offering other people a chance to get a start in the industry.

Yeah, and he's been pretty open about all of this. What has he been posting? Can you describe it for our listeners? David is an accomplished communicator on Instagram about his lifestyle and the New York City towing business. He's in the comments on Gothamist Instagram posts on the story that we ran saying, thank you for the attention. So he embraces this lifestyle.

And it's a kind of a lifestyle of the rich and the famous he's portraying with tattoos, cigarettes, nice cars, big trucks, if that's what you're into. It fits into this kind of social media manosphere almost of high testosterone, powerful vehicles. And I could totally see young men looking up to this guy who plays by his own rules, who operates tow trucks blatantly without the license you're supposed to get from the city. So, Liam, you're reporting on our news site Gothamus actually says that he had NYPD officers on his payroll. What happened there? Yeah, the NYPD confirmed to us.

That was in the past. It's not a current situation. But they did confirm that officers were federally charged in connection with a towing kickback scheme. So he's not full of hot air with those claims that he had previously made about working with the police to steer those tow truck. stores crashes. And that's a type of corruption that's gone back for decades with the NYPD as far as its relation to shady tow truck companies. Yeah, you're talking about it being a long-running problem. Talk more about how widespread this is, you know, beyond this one guy. We know that the unlicensed fleet of tow trucks in New York City is pretty huge. It's more than 700 trucks.

And we also know that David's trucks didn't even show up in our initial examination. of the data because they don't even use tow truck license plates. Like they use passenger plates that you might throw on a regular car. So we're not even capturing that in our assessment of how big this is. Though I will say I can consistently go out and find unlicensed tow trucks all day long in New York City. When I'm reporting on other stories, they're driving by me, they're going through red lights. They're all over the place. Yeah, I mean, I was out there with you.

You know, I saw it for myself. It was really cool, though, that Mayor Mumdani actually responded to your initial reporting earlier this year. What do we know about any efforts being taken? Is the city trying to crack down on this? This city has sent warnings to licensed tow truck companies. They've issued fines to license tow truck companies. The NYPD has said some of the incidents that they saw David involved in could rise to a level of a traffic ticket if an officer were to observe the information. fraction, which was doing donuts for a promotional video in Flushing Meadows.

But if you hear what I'm saying there, I'm saying licensed companies. As far as we know, there has not been a comprehensive effort since our reporting came out to crack down on the unlicensed towing industry. That's WMYC's Liam Quigley. Thanks a lot, Liam. Thank you. To hear more of Liam's investigative reporting on unlicensed tow trucks, check the link in our description.

Thanks for listening to NYC Now. I'm Jenae Pierre. Enjoy the rest of your Memorial Day. See you next time.