QUEENS — After serving as commanding officer of the 103rd Precinct in Jamaica for four-and-a-half years, Inspector Charles McEvoy will be transferred to the School Safety Division, authorities announced.
McEvoy, who was informed about his new assignment on Monday night, will begin his new job next week, he said at a 103rd Precinct Community Council meeting Tuesday night.
He said he welcomed “the new position and the challenge.”
“We’ve done a tremendous amount of great work in this precinct; I’m certainly very proud of it,” he said about his tenure at the precinct that includes Jamaica, Hollis and Lakewood.
McEvoy, a 25-year NYPD veteran, who has worked at a number of precincts in Brooklyn, before becoming commanding officer of the 102nd Precinct in Richmond Hill, to later hold the same position at the 103rd Precinct in Jamaica, will now serve as executive officer — second in command — of the School Safety Division.
McEvoy said his biggest achievement while working in Jamaica was “forming a great relationship with the community.”
“I’m going to miss this place and the people,” he said. “I met lifelong friends here.”
Donna Clopton, president of the 103rd Precinct Community Council, said that McEvoy was very dedicated to the community, and so was his wife Patricia, who organized several backpack drives to help local kids.
She said that last year, the couple delivered backpacks to children living in a local homeless shelter on McEvoy’s day off.
“He is a tough act to follow,” she said.
Beulah Wilson, 66, a retiree and longtime Jamaica resident, said that McEvoy is “a really community-minded person.”
“They will never find another commander like him,” she said.
McEvoy said that as of Tuesday night it was not clear who will replace him.
Under his tenure, overall crime went down by 7.3 percent and the number of shooting incidents decreased by 3.8 percent, McEvoy said.
According to the NYPD’s website, the School Safety Division oversees more than 5,000 school safety agents and more than 200 uniformed police officers.
