By Jeremy Walsh
Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Police Commissioner Ray Kelly said all 914 recruits graduating from the Police Academy will be assigned to Operation Impact, which floods high-crime areas with police manpower. In addition, they said, the current group of 900 officers in the program will remain assigned to the program, doubling its size.The 103rd Precinct, headquartered in Jamaica, will receive four dozen rookie officers to help bring down crime in southeastern Queens even though police statistics show overall crime dropped in the precinct more than 2 percent in 2007.The 48 additional officers will patrol the busy Jamaica area near Hillside Avenue and Merrick Boulevard, one of the NYPD's designated impact zones.”Basically we will get 48 new cops and we will put them in a concentrated area called the impact zone where the commanding officer feels the bulk of the crime exists,” said Detective Richard Lowe of the 103rd Precinct.The 110th and the 115th precincts, which cover Corona, East Elmhurst, Elmhurst and Jackson Heights, will also receive new recruits, Kelly and Bloomberg said. The precincts share a border along Roosevelt Avenue, which the NYPD has designated an impact zone.Though the Roosevelt Avenue corridor has seen its share of shootings and assaults outside bars, and Queens District Attorney Richard Brown has called it a hotbed for fraudulent ID cards, overall crime was down for 2007 in both the 110th and 115th precincts, according to police statistics.It was unclear how many of the 914 new recruits would be assigned to the 110th and the 115th. Police officials did not return phone calls or e-mails by press time Friday.Operation Impact began in 2003 with the commissioner providing rookie officers to precincts with high crime areas, according to the Police Department. In previous years, officers assigned to Operation Impact were reassigned after a few months, Kelly said. Ivan Pereira contributed to this article.Reach reporter Jeremy Walsh by e-mail at jwalsh@timesledger.com or by phone at 718-229-0300, Ext. 154.
