By day, Olufunmilola Obe commands the NYPD’s Transportation Bureau as a three-star chief. By night, and in the precious hours between shifts, she was buried in casebooks and legal briefs, chasing a second calling. After four years of night school, Obe achieved what she once only imagined: passing the bar exam while still on the job, proving that even at the highest levels of policing, ambition doesn’t stand still.
Chief Obe supervises the Transportation Bureau, which oversees ticketing, moving and parking violations, traffic congestion, and, most importantly to her, keeping New Yorkers safe from deadly traffic collisions. While the inner workings of the Big Apple have now become imperative in her everyday life, it was not always this way.
While she was born in the United States, Obe grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, where she described her childhood with loving parents. But as she grew older, she yearned for more opportunities and decided to move to New York in 1989 at the tender age of 19, only to be greeted by the city’s blistering cold.
“My foundation, everything that I knew was just really based on Nigerian culture,” Obe said. “I came in March of 1989, right away, I was welcomed by snow. It was really an adjustment, since you have sunshine all year, for the most part, maybe some rain, but I had never really experienced cold like this. I think that was one thing that really shook me.”
Soon after arriving in New York, Obe wasted no time in pursuing opportunity. She enrolled at City College and took a job at JCPenney to help make ends meet, balancing coursework with long retail shifts. It was during those early years that she discovered the NYPD’s cadet program, which is an initiative that trains young people in policing while helping cover the cost of college. The idea immediately captured her attention. For Obe, it wasn’t just a job; it was a pathway. But convincing her family was another challenge entirely; they were firmly opposed to her joining the police force.
“My family was a little resistant to the idea of working in law enforcement. It may be the fear of the unknown, because I don’t have a single family member, even in Nigeria, that’s tied to law enforcement,” Obe said.
In the same way she took it upon herself to move to the Big Apple as a teenager, she resisted her family’s fears and joined the NYPD, never looking back. Before she knew it, she became a fully fledged police officer in 1994, when she first worked out of the 17th Precinct as a patrol cop.
Describing herself as ambitious, Obe worked her way up through the ranks over the years, becoming a three-star chief in 2023. If that was not enough, all the while she spent every ounce of her free time studying to become a lawyer, an aspiration she ultimately achieved.
“I always wanted my entire life, even during childhood, to be a lawyer. I always wanted to do it. But it just took a little time getting there. I started law school in 2018. So, four years of night school,” Obe said, adding that having the law degree aided her even further with her profession. “It just puts a lot more things into perspective as it pertains to department policy, just a clearer understanding as to how the NYPD works.”
Now in her mid-50s, Obe has no plans to slow down. If anything, she says, her ambitions are evolving. After conquering the bar exam, she hopes one day to step into a classroom and pass along the lessons she’s gathered over decades in uniform and in law books, mentoring the next generation the way others once guided her.
Yet even as she speaks about the future, her thoughts drift backward. Reflecting on the Nigerian schoolgirl she once was, curious, determined, and oceans away from the life she would eventually build, Obe pauses. For a moment, she seems to peer through time itself, her eyes welling as she considers just how far that young girl has come.
“I would say to that little girl: I thank God for my successes, my ups and downs. I thank my family. I’m really grateful for family and grateful for the support over the years, also, but for me, just, I thank God for everything in my life,” Obe said.
