Police collected 50 guns yesterday on the Lower East Side at the neighborhood’s first buyback program — a long-sought event finally scheduled after two cops were shot this year in area housing projects.
The weapons were turned in — no questions asked — over six hours at Rutgers Houses, a housing project that has been plagued with violence.
Among the haul of firearms were 30 revolvers, 14 semiautomatic pistols and a scattering of BB and pellet guns, police said.
One man even forked over a rifle that he said he had used for deer hunting but simply didn’t want in the house anymore.
“I have a child now,” he said.
Each handgun was worth a $200 bank card, and the rifle and BB guns fetched $20.
“They don’t have to give a name,” said Michael Steele, a Rutgers community leader who helped organize the event.
Residents had pleaded with cops to hold the buyback amid a spate of shootings, as first reported by The Post last week.
Officer Thomas Richards was shot Feb. 27 by a suspected drug dealer during a foot chase on Columbia Street near Delancey Street, police said.
He was hit by a single bullet — but was saved when it bounced off an extra ammo clip on his gun belt, cops said. Accused assailant Louis Martinez, 24, was charged with attempted murder.
On July 5, Officer Brian Groves was saved by his bulletproof vest after getting shot in the chest while patrolling the Seward Park houses on Essex Street.
The assailant remains on the lam.
Most recently, on Oct. 6, 29-year-old Charles Fernandez was gunned down outside a local barber shop. He had been feuding with another man inside the Jose Beauty Salon and Barber Shop on Forsyth Street when Joshua Nunez, 21, allegedly blew him away with an illegal handgun.
“When so many people are carrying guns, nobody is safe,” said Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a proponent of the buyback program. “Not children, not adults, not families, no one.”
Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr., who attended the event, said there have been almost 130 shootings in Manhattan this year — and more than 150 victims as of Oct. 21.
Although the buyback is anonymous, some residents worried there was still too much mistrust of cops in the community and people with guns are hesitant to turn them over.
“People think the cops want to track who they are. Say you committed a crime years ago, and you want to change your life,” said Karen Stewart, 35, who lives in Rutgers Houses. “They think if they bring it in, it will still have evidence.”
Some guns are checked to see if they have been used in past crimes, but not all of them, according to police.
The program is a vital tool in removing guns from the hands of criminals, elected officials advocate.
“Our community can be saved by taking illegal guns off the street,” said Chinatown Councilwoman Margaret Chin.
“We want our community to be safe. We want to make sure that our children can play outside in the yard without fear of hearing gun shots or getting shot,” she said.
Since the program started in 2008, the city has spent about $1.4 million buying back about 8,200 firearms at sites across the city, according to the NYPD.