NYPD members move unlicensed vendors from Roosevelt Avenue, Queens, NYC as part of an operation to address public safety and quality-of-life concerns on October 15, 2024. (Photo/Mariana Hernandez)
Anthony Betancourt, a street vendor from Venezuela, stood watching as four New York City Police Department officers confiscated his fruit and his stand. For months, he’d made a living selling bananas, tangerines, avocados, and strawberries beneath the 90 St-Elmhurst Avenue subway station. Now, his job and investment are gone. Not only that, as police moved away, Betancourt held his first-ever ticket for unlicensed vending, a violation that will cost him $1,000.
“What am I supposed to do?” he said. “I have to sell; I have a family.”
Betancourt has been in the U.S. for about a year. He arrived with his mother and a son, who helped him set up the fruit stand in Queens after he’d tried, and failed, to get other jobs. Every week, he spent $1,000 on fruit, and every day he made $70 to $100 selling it under the subway station in Jackson Heights.
But that very spot, in Jackson Heights, was one of the sites targeted by Mayor Eric Adams’ Operation Restore Roosevelt, a 90-day crackdown on quality-of-life issues like unlicensed vending and sex work that began in mid-October. Along Roosevelt Avenue, from 74th to 111th Street, the Operation Restore Roosevelt task force has cleared out vendors, confiscated their carts and food and issued tickets for, among other things, selling food without permits and leaving too much trash behind.
Unlicensed Vendors return to their vending spots after the police officers issuing tickets had left the area on Roosevelt Avenue on October 15, 2024. (Credit: Mariana Hernandez)
Today, the streets are starting to empty out, as more vendors, intimidated by the crackdown, are increasingly reluctant to set up shop in the area.
By the end of the sweep, Betancourt had not only lost $1,000 in unsold fruit, he also faced fines for his ticket and for five more in his son’s name, a bill that totalled $6,000, he said.
Since it’s not required to have a social security number to obtain a mobile food permit and license, street vending has become a popular way for undocumented immigrants to make a living in New York City. According to a study by the Immigration Research Initiative, Queens has the second highest concentration of vendors after Manhattan. Most of them sell in Corona, Jackson Heights, and Flushing.
Janneth Lojano, who spent months searching in vain for cleaning jobs in Manhattan and Brooklyn, decided that selling food on the street, illegally, was her only way to make money. She set up a cart on Roosevelt Avenue selling fried chicken and salchipapas, a South American dish of sausage and fried potatoes, and she applied for a mobile food vending license hoping to one day sell her food legally.
To legally sell food from a vending cart, someone needs a mobile food vendor license and a mobile food vending permit. To apply for a mobile food vendor license, they must pay a $50 fee and register for an eight hour food protection course, which costs an additional $53. Once they have the food vendor license, they can prepare and serve food. In order to serve that food from a food truck or pushcart, an applicant needs a vending permit. But it’s impossible to get a vending permit right now because the city says it’s given out the maximum number of these permits and won’t release any more. The waitlist has been closed for months.
A study by Making Policy Public, a project of the Center for Urban Pedagogy (CUP), showed it’s “virtually impossible to get a vending license in New York City because of strict caps, or limits, placed on the number of vendors in the 1970s and ‘80s.” As a result, three-quarters of mobile food vendors in New York City are selling without a permit, risking an encounter with the police that could lead to a fine from $250 to $1,000.
Paying tickets has become the cost of doing business.
“If you get a summons every day for $200, you’re paying rent,” said Christian Cassagnol, District Manager of Queens Community Board 4.
Those who cannot afford to pay a ticket, often have to borrow money from friends and family or hope the judge will dismiss the ticket. If a ticket goes unpaid, a higher penalty may be imposed, and the city can initiate a civil case against the vendor.
Some unlicensed vendors have found it easier to rent permits from military veterans who are eligible to apply for a free lifetime vendor’s license. These veterans can charge up to $150 per day for the use of the permit, according to street vendors. When the police arrive to issue tickets, the vendors say the pushcart belongs to a veteran and they are simply operating it.
Vendors like Lojano, who cannot afford to pay someone for their permit, said during weekdays, when the police’s crackdown is more intense, she has to stay off the streets if she doesn’t want to risk getting a ticket. But she can’t stay away for long. She owes her landlord $600 a month in rent, and she also sends money home to Ecuador to pay for her daughter’s cosmetology school tuition.
Many unauthorized vendors who say that selling on the streets has become increasingly difficult are now trying to unionize. Roughly 250 unlicensed street vendors from Corona Plaza, Junction Boulevard, and Roosevelt Avenue have come together as the Roosevelt Avenue Street Vendors with the goal of lobbying the NYC Department of Consumer and Worker Protection for more vending permits.
Early October, the group went to local City Councilmember Francisco Moya to ask if they could sell legally at the Willets Point revitalization project, a large-scale development where the city is building affordable housing units, a new school, and a soccer stadium. Moya was not in his office when the vendors arrived so a secretary received their petition. The vendors haven’t heard back from him. Calls and emails requesting a comment from him went unreturned.
Irene Arizaga, an Ecuadorian street vendor, initially started the Roosevelt Avenue Street Vendors organization as a WhatsApp group for sharing information about local authorities. Those on the chat would warn their fellow vendors about police in the area so that everyone could gather their belongings and clear out in order to avoid potential tickets. From there, the chat, called “Unión y Fuerza” (Force and Union), turned into the beginning of their organization attempt. But the fledgling union is facing internal strife.
Distrust has emerged as a major issue, undermining the organization’s goals. During a meeting in early October, Katty Díaz, former president of the Roosevelt Avenue Street Vendors organization, found herself in a small room surrounded by 50 concerned vendors.
“Settle down, colleagues; please let us speak,” she said as voices rose, questioning funds raised to buy t-shirts with the organization’s name. Some were accusing Díaz and an accountant of misusing the money. Although both have denied any wrongdoing, and presented receipts for every expense, the attendees wanted their money back. By the end of the meeting, Díaz resigned and Arizaga decided it would be best to pause the organization’s activities until the situation calmed down and the leaders regained the vendors’ trust.
Now, as the Operation Restore Roosevelt task force continues to ticket vendors and clear them off streets, the Roosevelt Avenue Street Vendors organization has renewed purpose. For Arizaga, organizing and protesting the enforcement is the group’s best means of defending their right to work. “We don’t want to work clandestinely,” she said. “We want to contribute to the State, but we are in a war where we cannot defend ourselves.”
About the author(s)
Mariana Hernandez is a Mexican journalist based in New York City, immigration and international issues. She is an M.S. candidate at Columbia Journalism School.