I’ve lauded Bloomberg in the past for his forward thinking initiatives such as GreeNYC and 311, but this is just inexcusable.
Not only did the City spend nearly $1 million on typewriters this past year, some of the models they bought retail for up to $649 apiece! You can buy a computer for $649.
Not only does this seem like a huge waste of taxpayer money, it doesn’t seem to be very green. Think about the amount of paper that could be saved every year not to mention whatever they spend on ribbons for these relics.
“It just doesn’t make sense that we can’t enter these [vouchers] on computer,” one cop told The Post.
When the typewriter ribbons run out, as they often do, officers say the search for a working machine turns into a scene right of the ’70s sitcom “Barney Miller.”
“We have to sneak around the rest of the precinct in search of a ribbon to steal,” a cop said.
The reliance on typewriters contributes to the slow pace of processing arrests, said Dr. Edith Linn, a retired NYPD cop and professor of criminal justice at Berkeley College in Manhattan.
“The system is hobbled by redundant paperwork, misused personnel, broken equipment, backward technology,” Linn says in her 2008 book “Arrest Decisions.”
At least Chief Wiggum is smart enough to type his reports up on his invisible typewriter. Now that’s green!
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