A city Parks Department enforcement patrol officer was reassigned and placed on administrative duties, an agency spokesperson said on Monday, one day after a video surfaced on social media showing a physical altercation involving a 14-year-old girl accused of selling food in a Lower Manhattan park without a license.
The Parks Department said the altercation started as officers were trying to destroy the vendors’ perishable items, which were deemed unsafe for consumption.
Footage of the incident – which officials said took place around 2 p.m. at Battery Park – quickly spread through social media. In the 50-second video posted by musician and social media influencer Marc Rebillet– which has been viewed more than 8 million times as of Monday afternoon – the 14-year-old can be seen struggling as a man in a city Parks uniform attempts to apprehend her.
Bystanders in the video can be heard repeatedly yelling in protest, or asking for a female officer to intervene instead. The 14-year-old is eventually pulled away from the officers by other people who can not be seen in the video.
It does not show what took place immediately before, or after, the incident.
The teenager received a juvenile report, a Parks Department spokesperson said. A desk appearance ticket was also issued to a 32-year-old woman involved in the altercation, officials said, who was also shown wrangling with officers in the video.
“When individuals have repeatedly flouted the law, we take additional enforcement actions, and there are instances when it is necessary to place violators and individuals obstructing the law under arrest,” agency spokesperson Kelsey Jean-Baptiste said in an email.
On Monday, Mayor Eric Adams — who said he had seen the video — said that the authorities were forced to intervene in an area that “has received a substantial number of 311 complaints because of illegal vendors.”
He accused the 32-year-old woman, who has been described by some officials, including Adams, as the teenager’s mother, of being “a habitual abuser” of the street vending law who “has been told several times and she refuses to comply.”
But Adams also echoed similar comments he’s made in the past urging the federal government to help issue more temporary work authorizations for migrants.
“The larger problem here that no one wants to talk about is that it is not dignified to have people unable to provide for themselves,” Adams told reporters at an unrelated press conference on Monday. “We’ve been saying this for almost two years now. Let them work.”
There are tens of thousands of street vendors in the city – and not nearly enough licenses to go around due to a cap that’s been placed on the number of authorizations that can be doled out in the city, according to the city’s Independent Budget Office. That means some people have been on a waitlist while others are forced to work without a license and potentially face legal consequences if they are caught.
Mohamed Attia — who heads the Street Vendor Project, which advocates for these workers — said his organization is attempting to get in contact with the teen and her family. He said the incident on Sunday is the same risk that unlicensed street vendors face daily as the city stalls on issuing enough permits.
“Every time they step out of the door trying to make an honest living as vendors, they are taking the risk of facing this harassment, getting ticketed, getting arrested, having their merchandise confiscated and it goes to how we are regulating street vending as a city,” Attia said in an interview. “The city is failing the vendors, the city is failing its residents.”
Local elected officials aim to pass bills this legislative session that would either decriminalize street vending – or lift the cap altogether. Bronx Councilmembers Amanda Farias and Pierina Sanchez are sponsoring a package of bills that would erode the longstanding issues over the legality of street vending. This includes a bill that would effectively remove the decades-long cap on street vending licenses.
“Vending caps result in neighborhoods, like mine, where an estimated over 80% vendors operate without a license, with little to no access to proper education on how to do their work in ways that are harmonious with our communities and promote health, safety and public wellbeing, and no path to full compliance even if they were willing,” Sanchez said in an email. “The present system is unjust.”
Farias said in a statement that she was "disappointed and disturbed" to learn of the incident in Battery Park and that immigrants to the city should not be met with "immediate criminalization." "Enforcement of street vending needs to stay focused on the appropriate measures in place — fines and seizure of property — not violent arrests," she said. "It is clear that New Yorkers need more opportunities for dignified work."
Queens Councilmember Shekar Krishnan also introduced a bill that would repeal the misdemeanor criminal penalties for street vendors. It’s sponsored by more than one-third of the 51-member chamber.
“No person, especially not a child, should face arrest and jail time for selling fruit in a public park,” Krishnan – who also chairs the Parks committee – said in an interview. “The video of Parks Enforcement Officers aggressively, physically detaining a child as her mother and fellow New Yorkers try to intervene is shocking.”
There are more than 20,000 people on a waitlist for two types of street vendor documentation, the IBO reported in January.
And the city stands to gain millions of dollars if it lets more street vendors work legally – the IBO estimates the city would receive a net revenue gain of $1.7 million if just 10% of the people on the waitlist were approved. The number climbs to $17 million if everyone currently on the waitlist receives a license.
This story has been updated with comment from Councilmember Amanda Farias.
