The departure of officers from the NYPD remains unabated.

Everyone criticizes these brave men and women in blue. People in authority have stigmatized them, and the public treats them as if they are fascists. The naysayers are the same people who would call 911 when they need a cop and then bitch about them taking so long to get to them.

Things have never been ideal in New York City, but law and order truly went crazy during the George Floyd riots and COVID-19 lockdowns. Looting became commonplace, and the police were not allowed to conduct their jobs.

Prior to the Floyd riots, former Mayor Bil de Commio, allowed New Yorkers to pour water on New York’s finest and forbid officers to do anything about it. What de Blasio and others never realized is that when you delegitimize police to the common man on the street, you have delegitimized the law. When criminals and thugs believe it is okay to take bottles and buckets of water and pour them over the heads of working officers, knowing nothing is going to happen to them, it sends a message that their superiors don’t have Blue’s back. And that’s when all holy hell breaks loose in the city.

Is it any surprise that so many officers are leaving? The city demands a lot from the job to start off with, but when the politicians get involved and blatantly show their disregard for the cops, and all based on a series of lies, it forces police officers to the brink, and they find solutions elsewhere.

According to frightening new data obtained by The Post, former NYPD Commissioner Keechant Sewell resigned despite a steady procession of New York’s Finest beating her to the exits.

According to NYPD pension data, 648 policemen resigned before retiring this year, a 22% increase from 2021, when 530 left, and an 87% increase from 2020, when 347 resigned.

The alarming “voluntary quits” combined with NYPD recruiting issues leave the 34,000 uniformed officers “at least 1,200 short,” according to the police union.

“Cops are being squeezed from every direction. They are working inhumane amounts of forced overtime. The brass is pushing for more enforcement, while the police-oversight complex is pushing to ruin more cops’ careers,” said Patrick Hendry, president of the Police Benevolent Association, which represents a little over 21,000 rank-and-file officers.

“Many cops can’t afford to keep taking that risk because the pay is still too low,” he explained. “The NYPD will not be able to recruit its way out of this staffing emergency. It needs to make the job livable for the cops it already has.”

What I predict will start happening is the city will fill the roles of the NYPD with less desirable people, possibly even gang members because they have no alternative path at this point. They have made the job so meaningless and harmful to the lives of street cops that decent people everywhere would touch the job with a ten-foot nightstick.

Officers often work for 20 years or more to receive their full pension, which might be 50% of their final average wage. Statistics show those who are “running their time,” or using earned days off before leaving. Those cops are still counted as being on the force by the NYPD.

At the current rate, nearly 1,300 cops are expected to leave before reaching retirement age this year, matching last year’s record of 1,297 early exits. Imagine how bad things must be when a person has to make the decision to give up the pension they were working toward and leave the job because of leftist politicians who made the job and their lives miserable.

Insiders have said that the current exodus of officers was prompted by the “continued piling on” by the City Council and police watchdogs who spend more time attacking cops than even considering what is happening on the streets with rising crime rates. The people who live in gated communities with armed security haven’t got a clue as to what they are doing to the city with their asinine anti-cop agendas.

From the New York Post:

The City Council, which is poised to pass a sweeping package of bills that would force the NYPD to file millions of reports on even the most minor encounters with New Yorkers.

The measures also would mandate cops speedily turn over officers’ body-camera recordings to state investigators, and that the department disclose more information about traffic stops and internal operations.

It sounds like a t-shirt I used to see a lot when I was growing up in Philadelphia that said, “The Beatings Shall Continue Until Morale Improves.”