"Despite arguing the city will do more with less, crime rates will eventually begin to rise again if we continue to shrink the force," Vallone warned. Criticizing Mayor Michael Bloomberg for painting "an overly optimistic picture" about police staffing levels, City Councilmember Peter Vallone Jr. charged that in reality the mayor's plan could cause the force to lose possibly thousands of officers.

Vallone, chair of the council Public Safety Committee, said the mayor's proposal would add only 500 cops for all of next year, down from the usual 2,400, and scoffed that this would not come close to replacing the 2,000 to 3,000 officers lost through attrition annually.

"Despite arguing the city will do more with less, crime rates will eventually begin to rise again if we continue to shrink the force," Vallone warned.

Putting it another way, Vallone (D- Astoria) declared: "Saying we are adding 500 officers when we are in fact decimating the police force is a head-inthe sand attitude that we cannot afford to have. Public safety is the catalyst that allows the city to prosper. By cutting cops, we are not saving money but wasting it."

Vallone explained that the New York Police Department (NYPD) will drop to a low of 33,000 officers this year, and may dip below 33,000 next year. He said that after reaching a high of 41,000 officers in 2001, the police force will hit a low not seen since before the Safe Streets, Safe City program was implemented in 1991

Since the Police Academy can only train a finite number of cadets, he concluded, "This hit will ensure that the NYPD will be below adequate staffing levels for many years to come."

Vallone noted that because of the lower number of officers, crime has already started to creep upwards. Although total felony crime is down four percent this year—the smallest decline since 2001— both murders and robberies are up slightly. And, he added, "District attorney offices have testified that total misdemeanor arrests, which include graffiti and shoplifting, are already on the rise."

Vallone's assessment of the city's crime fighting picture is somewhat at variance with the mayor's most recent comments.

Speaking on his weekly radio show this past Sunday, the mayor stated, "Even with more than 3,000 fewer officers in their ranks, the NYPD has continued to drive down crime in each of the last seven years."

One of the strategies that has made that possible, he said, was Operation Impact, a program that deploys extra resources to areas that have defied the overall decline in crime.

He said since the program began in January 2003, "We've cut crime as much as 30 percent in some of the most notorious crime-ridden areas."

The mayor said the program would be continued in 2009.