NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea says the department is transitioning its anti-crime plainclothes officers to other units.

Shea said during a news briefing that the NYPD would transition close to 600 officers in plainclothes anti-crime units to a variety of roles, including the detective bureau and neighborhood policing assignments.

"We welcome reform, but we believe meaningful reform comes from within," said Shea. 

Shea said it was a policy shift and no reflection of the officers.

"They have done an exceptional job, but I think again it's time to move forward and change how we police in the city. We can do it with brains, we can do it with gile and we can move away from brute force, and it is lost on no one certainly not the people who live in the neighborhoods that we serve that endure being stopped or their children being stopped. We can do it better, we can do it smarter and we will,” said Shea.