The NYPD is enlisting school safety agents to combat social distancing violators across the city, The Post has learned.
Hoping to bolster what has been a scattershot crackdown on city residents failing to stay away from one another, the department will deploy the agents across parks and other attractions.
With Department of Education buildings shuttered, school safety agents have been used in other capacities in recent months.
Some are helping monitor food-distribution stations and “enrichment” learning centers for the children of essential workers and others.
Critics have assailed the NYPD for uneven enforcement of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s social distancing orders.
Orthodox Jews, black and Hispanic residents have all asserted that they have been prioritized for enforcement while city parks are routinely packed with minimally distant and often mask-free rogues.
De Blasio has pleaded with city residents to maintain a distance of 6 feet between each other in order to curb the spread of coronavirus.
The city’s largest police union called for an end to the NYPD’s enforcement of social distancing, arguing that they have been given vague guidelines and are absorbing public backlash.
Police Benevolent Association president Patrick Lynch argued that the responsibility is detracting from more pressing areas of city crime-fighting.