Jessica Tisch trades NYC's 'war on rats' to become NYPD's 'battle-tested' leader

Jessica Tisch, whose public service spans three mayoral administrations, took the oath of office Monday, becoming the fourth NYPD commissioner to serve under Mayor Eric Adams.

Adams called Tisch a "battle-tested leader." Until last week, she served as head of the city Sanitation Department, leading Adams’s “war on rats” and his “trash revolution,” using the agency to implement curbside composting and clean up city streets. Sanitation's First Deputy Commissioner Javier Lojan will take the helm of that agency, department spokesperson Josh Goodman said.

She takes the helm of the country’s largest police force at a difficult moment. She will succeed interim Police Commissioner Thomas Donlon, a former FBI agent whose home was raided by the FBI soon after his appointment. Donlon’s predecessor, Edward Caban, stepped down amid an FBI investigation. Adams’s first commissioner, Keechant Sewell, left after speaking out about sexism within the department.

After Sewell resigned, several policing experts told Gothamist that Sewell struggled to set her own agenda with Adams, a former NYPD captain, in the mayor's office. But in her speech Monday, Tisch said that – at least in her prior role at the Sanitation Department – she was given autonomy.

“You’ve trusted judgment, given me incredible latitude and, yes, independence to be thoughtful and creative,” she told Adams.

Tisch was sworn in on a Bible held by her mother Merryl and standing beside her two children and her nephew.

Former Police Commissioner Bill Bratton attended the ceremony. Afterward, he told reporters that Adams must allow Tisch to choose her own team.

“I was very fortunate as commissioner to be allowed — even under [former Mayors Rudolph] Giuliani and under [Bill] de Blasio — to pick my team,” he said. “The good news is [Tisch and Adams] are experienced at working with each other and quite obviously he's very comfortable with her.”

Tisch declined to take questions after her swearing in. Department officials said she went with her family to check out her new office and her schedule was still in flux. They also said she is not yet ready to announce any staffing decisions.

Tisch is a Harvard graduate and lifelong New Yorker who served in various city roles under Mayors Michael Bloomberg and de Blasio. She never served as a uniformed police officer.

She first came to the department in 2008, when she served as director of counterterrorism, counsel to the police commissioner and deputy commissioner of technology. She is credited for introducing body-worn cameras to the department and overhauling how crime stats are reported to the public.

In her opening comments after being sworn in, she credited four female, three-star chiefs for “taking a sledgehammer to the glass ceiling” of the NYPD. She earned a chuckle from the crowd when she described the first time she came to work at police headquarters mentioning the “outrageously repetitive paperwork,” an environment she is largely credited with modernizing.

This story has been updated with new information.