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“You could start to see some changes in the mid-1990s,” says PBA delegate Farrell, who joined the command after graduating from the Academy in April 1991. “I don’t have any more solid reason for it than anybody else does. But you probably have to factor in things like the crackdown on quality of life crimes, the arrest of key dealers, some void in the leadership of gangs, and, let’s not forget, the value of the land around here. It seemed to dawn on a lot of people, whether they were buying or selling, that there was no profit to be made by just letting things continue to fall apart.”

Farrell’s point is clearly in evidence as she and Olivier head for the scene of what is described only as a “vehicular accident.” Practically every block they go through on the way to the call at Bedford and Pacific is active with repairmen, roofers and sanders working on the ubiquitous brownstones and greystones. Whereas plywood was once a flag of abandonment, it is now more often an advertisement for the window or sidewalk patch that will be attended to tomorrow.

The accident turns out to be for a gray Volvo that blew a tire and limped into a sidewalk space at a curbside reserved for a corner church. “What’s the big deal?” the driver, already hefting a spare out of his trunk, wants to know. “They actually call you from the church saying I was blocking their way?”

Olivier assures the guy that’s neither here nor there as long as he changes the tire and moves on. The driver thinks that’s just another reason for bafflement. “Like that’s what we get into a panic about around here these days? We block the driveway of a church? I remember when you couldn’t walk down some of these streets at noon because you might get popped. Don’t you remember that?”

The Haitian native Olivier has heard about it more than remembered it as personal experience. “The older guys were already talking about the bad old days when I got here after the Academy in November 1997,” he says. “I didn’t miss it. The fact is, whatever the reputation of a neighborhood, you never know where trouble is going to jump out. You can get a call to the quietest house on the quietest block in the city, and maybe that’s the one where there’s somebody waiting with a gun.”

Farrell agrees. “People ask me what’s been my scariest moment on the job, expecting to hear something about shootouts or wild chases down Franklin Avenue. But the scariest moment for any cop is just arriving on a strange scene. You’re walking into something you know nothing about. ‘What’s in that room?’ ‘Who’s behind that wall?’ ‘Does he have a gun or a knife?’ ‘Is she mentally stable?’ ‘Does he have something against cops?’ ‘Maybe she just called to lure us here.’ All that kind of thing goes through your mind until you know exactly what it is you’re dealing with.”

“When you don’t know the whole picture,” chimes in Olivier, “you may not be helpless, but you’re at your most vulnerable.”

Both cops recall September 11, 2001 as a day when they were both helpless and vulnerable. “The worst part for somebody not directly in it all was listening to those cops screaming for their lives on Channel 11,” Farrell says. “You just had to listen. You couldn’t do anything.”

“That was hell,” Olivier nods.

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