72nd Precinct officer praised for creating public info bulletin

Scam alerts. Public safety tips. Identity theft warnings. Community events. Contact information.

All this and more are now easily visible and available to anyone walking into the 72^nd Precinct station house at 830 Fourth Avenue in Sunset Park, thanks to the initiative of precinct Crime Prevention Officer Anthony Nuccio.

A month ago, Nuccio, who has been with the 72^nd precinct for three years, got the okay from precinct commanding officer Captain James Grant to take an extra computer monitor that had been sitting around, put it at the front desk, and then set it up to auto-play a PowerPoint presentation of important community information—many available in three languages—that he had created using local and citywide NYPD flyers.

The “welcome screen” went up during the first week of February and has already met with praise from both residents and higher-ups at the NYPD. The digital public bulletin is the first of its kind to be implemented at a police precinct for public consumption.

“There was only so much room on the bulletin board [for flyers] and PowerPoint is simple and can get more information out so it’s beneficial to the community,” Nuccio explained matter-of-factly. “Hopefully it’s the right step in line with [Police Commissioner Bill Bratton’s] vision of innovation.”

According to Grant, the computer bulletin is definitely in line with his philosophy of treating people “like family.”

“I meet with [Nuccio] weekly about crime prevention and had tasked him to put flyers at the door. He suggested putting up the monitor and I said to go ahead. [Now] Chief Colon from the NYPD Crime Prevention office was very happy that we took the initiative,” said Grant.

“There’s a lot of positive energy here and if I allow officers like Nuccio to have open communication and to run ideas by me, it benefits the community,” Grant added. “If you treat people with respect, you get it back ten-fold.”

The welcome screen features a dozen or so slides about ID and auto theft, crime prevention programs, counterterrorism information, scam alerts, the NY State Office of Victim Services, and more. Several are available in English, Spanish and Chinese, with more due to be translated soon. Community organizations such as the Brooklyn Chinese American Association have been helping with translation.

Asked whether he would like to see his welcome screen/public bulletin be implemented across the city at stationhouses, Nuccio admitted that it would be nice to see and would be “relatively easy for the department to implement” and can be easily updated with new material.

Whatever happens, Nuccio said he’s proud of his new program and the fact that it was a team effort between cops and community. “Captain Grant is very accepting to new ideas,” he said. “This wouldn’t have happened without his okay.”