By Jennifer Glickel
DNAinfo Reporter/Producer
MANHATTAN — The city is spending millions more enforcing a myriad of rules regulating street vendors than it brings in through those regulations, a new report says.
The city's Independent Budget Office estimated that the city costs associated with street vendor regulation came in at least $7.4 million in 2009, while the revenue only came in at $1.4 million.
The city's expenditures derive from issuing permits and licenses, constant police enforcement, and health department inspections. The largest source of revenue for the city is from fines — but significantly less money is collected in fines than is imposed on vendors.
In 2009, vendors were fined more than $9 million and in 2008 the fines imposed were $6.8 million. But of that combined $15.8 million fined, just shy of only $900,000 was retrieved.
Another complication to the street vendor oversight, the report found, is the multitude of rules and restrictions imposed upon the vendors, from food vendors having different time and location restraints than general merchandise vendors to unique rules that apply to able-bodied versus disabled veterans who sell goods on the street.
"These rules can change from one block to the next, making it difficult for the police, who have the primary enforcement role when vendors are on the streets, to know what applies and where," the IBO writes in its report.
"In Manhattan alone there are rules that restrict general merchandise vending on at least 160 blocks, with outright bans on some blocks and limits on hours or days vending is permitted on other blocks," it continues.
One commonly heard complaint about street vendors, the report said, is that they underpay sales tax, or even don't pay sales tax at all. The IBO could not find data to confirm or refute such complaints, but said that store owners often complain that the system is unfair and street vendors cheat the city and state out of tax revenue.
Ultimately, the IBO had a negative outlook on the relationship between the city, street vendors, business owners, and residents, writing, "While there may always be some tension between the interests of vendors and the interests of community residents and businesspeople, the current system appears to provide little relief to any of them."
Street vendors seemed to have a mixed view of their financial relationship with the city.
Hassan Salah, 21, who works a Mediterranean food pushcart on 56th Street and Sixth Avenue, said that the city doesn't do enough to earn the fees.
"The only real issue is that we give the city money with our business and they don't do much in return. In most places, the sidewalks are too high, so we've tried to talk to the DOT about fixing the problem. Their response is to tell us to move," Salah said. "So, in that sense, the city is difficult to deal with. But the Health Department regulations are good, of course, and as long as you follow the rules, they don't bother you."
Hot dog vendor Victor Yusef, 33, said he thought it was too easy to get tickets from the city.
"My problem is that the Health Department gives you tickets like that," Yusef said as he snapped his fingers. "They don't look at the important things like the food, its temperature, or whether I'm touching it with my hands when they watch me serve. They look at little things like if the thermometer is hanging in the right place. Each ticket is at least $1,000. It's not fair that they kill you with tickets like that."
But Jawid Ahmad, 30, whose halal food cart is joined on the southeast corner of 56th Street and Sixth Avenue by a fresh fruit cart and a hot dog vendor, said he's never had a problem.
"If you keep your cart clean, the Health Department doesn't bother you. In the five years I've been working here, I've never gotten a ticket from the Health Department. If you don't keep your cart clean, then of course you're going to complain," he said.
"I come from a country where there are no rules, no regulations at all," Ahmad said of his native Afghanistan. "I think the regulations are a good thing."
