'New' Police Commissioner Thinks Small

Unbeknownst to most New Yorkers, a 14-year-old girl from Queens whose central platform is strengthening community and police relations has taken over as the city's police commissioner.

As least for a day.

Yesterday morning, ninth-grader Gianna Lakesnauth and 129 other students from around the city were sworn in as temporary members of the New York City Police Department as part of the Police Athletic League's annual "Police Commissioner for a Day" essay competition. The students' essays were selected from 450 submissions addressing the question: "What steps would you take to reduce violent crimes and protect all New Yorkers?"

Ms. Lakesnauth's winning essay, which brought her $250, lunch with the real commissioner, Raymond Kelly, and a day of following him in his duties, focused on the small measures that can be taken to reduce crime.

She wrote that New Yorkers could be "a bit more careful, a bit more accepting of other people."

Ms. Lakesnauth also suggested that the police develop programs to teach students to accept others' religion, sexuality, ethnicity, and gender as a form of hate-crime prevention. She said she does not plan to join the NYPD — she wants to be a defense attorney or a doctor — but had submitted the essay upon encouragement from her English teacher.

Three weeks after submitting her essay, she said a good friend of hers was beaten up after leaving their high school.

Another applicant, a 16-year-old student from Yeshiva Darchai Menachem, Yosef Abrahamson, said his essay focused on "looking at the smaller crimes before they escalate to larger crimes." He lives in Crown Heights, where his identity as an African-American chasidic Jew has given him a unique perspective on the recent hate-crime incidents there.

Mr. Kelly said the event was designed to reduce some of those tensions by involving city youth in police work. "Because of the nature of what we do, in some communities there is always going to be a little friction. Hopefully this will ease that friction ... and help recruiting," he said.

Mr. Kelly has a recruit-in-waiting in Neivis Tolentino, 16, of Flatbush, who won the position of commanding officer of the 68th precinct for the second year in a row.

"After college, I want to join the police," he said, dressed in the blues of an officer in the NYPD's Law Enforcement Explorers program.