For years, City Councilman Donovan Richards pushed the city to create a new police precinct, the 116th, to serve southeast Queens. The project was shelved as part of the deal Tuesday night to adopt a new city budget. But Richards says he's fine with that.

“I think we should be doing much more preventative work and think of ideas to make sure you don’t need to build a precinct," Richards said.

What You Need To Know


  • The plan for the 116th Precinct was announced in 2017.

  • Instead of building the precinct, $92 million is going towards creating a community center at Roy Wilkins Park.

  • The 105th Precinct already serves the neighborhoods that the 116th would have covered.

  • The 105th Precinct has the largest geographic covered area.

The new precinct was announced back in 2017 to cover Rosedale, Laurelton and Springfield Gardens.

The stationhouse would have cost $92 million in capital funds.

Instead, that money will be used to build a community center with a food pantry in nearby Roy Wilkins Park.

That's exactly the kind of switch protesters and many politicians demanded as part of the "defund the police" movement, following the death of George floyd under the knee of a Minneapolis police officer.

“Being that it’s going to get $92 million, I’m not upset," Richards said.

The mayor called the community center a worthy investment. 

"We're going to keep working on response times. And this is something I think will happen at some point in the future, with the 116th Precinct, but right now it was right to reallocate those resources to a community center, the Roy Wilkins Center, and to really focus on young people," Mayor Bill DeBlasio said.

Khaleel Anderson, the Democratic nominee for the local state Assembly seat, which is vacant, said putting the precinct on hold is unacceptable.

“I’m frustrated with us losing resources, that’s what I’m frustrated about. The Black community, my friends and neighbors always get the short end of the stick," Anderson said.

The planned 116th Precinict would have been created by spliiting off some communities from the 105th Precinct, which is geographically the largest in the city, and the one with the highest police response times.

Richards said too many residents of the 105th are too far from the 105th Precinct stationhouse.

“There’s no way for them to build a relationship with the community," Richards said.

105th Precinct has a satellite station where the 116th Precinct was supposed to be built.

“The satellite precinct right by the Long Island railroad was created to kind of mitigate some of that some response time, but it’s not enough," Anderson said.

Residents have mixed opinions.

“It’s fine. You call the cops, in no time two to thre vehicles come out," Laurelton Resident Amin said.

But Bess DeBeathem, Federated Blocks of Laurelton's Treasurer, who has been fighting for the 116th since the 1970s, said she is furious.

"It takes them at least 13 minutes or so to get here in case we have a crime. I need to call and I think it’s unfair to blame the police for that," she said.

Those longer response times are going to continue for now - the trade off for a new community center and services.