Police chiefs from around the state met to talk about policing during these difficult times.  

Chief of the Greece Police Department, Patrick Phelan, is also president of the New York State Association of Chiefs of Police.

He allowed Spectrum News access to part of his meeting with chiefs throughout New York state on Friday.

The police officials are working on their efforts to meet the state’s reform expectations.

“Probably the most challenging one, the repeal of 50-A.  It takes place immediately," said Chief Phelan.

50-A is the public release of the personnel records of police officers.

“All of that has to be examined and redacted so that you don’t release information that is illegal to release," said Chief Phelan.

There’s concern that officers’ personal information is already getting in the hands of the wrong people.

"At this particular moment in time, it’s stepping up.  And it’s concerning for police officers. It’s concerning for me and there’s a lot of hate right now," said Chief Phelan.

In fact, Chief Phelan himself was a recent target.

“Somebody rolled up in front of my house, stopped at the end of my driveway about midnight and leaned on the horn for a while,” he said. “Obviously that didn’t physically hurt me, I’m OK. But in the time that we’re in it was clear to me that that was just somebody letting me know that this is your house and we know it. That’s the kind of thing that we’re facing.”

Digging deeper, Phelan talked about the so-called “blue flu.” The chief commented about the movement being heard about in Atlanta.

Officers are said to be calling in sick after prosecutors charged an officer with murder in connection with the death of Rayshard Brooks. Chief Phelan is not hearing that officers in our area will be catching the blue flu — but he is concerned about cops leaving the job in the wake of the recent troubles.

“What I am seeing is a massive amount of retirement and I think that will continue and I think officers will be leaving this job in droves," said Chief Phelan.

In fact, during Friday’s meeting, Phelan says he learned that the New York City Police Department received some 400 retirement requests this week alone.

Chief Phelan expects our area to follow suit to some degree, particularly, with the effort to recruit officers.

“Our recruiting pool will all but vanish, if not vanish entirely," said Phelan. 

He also says it's never been harder to than now to be an officer of the law, “People look at us and don’t see a human being and that’s not right. It’s not right. There’s a human being inside that uniform and we just ask to be treated like human beings like anybody else.”