The New York City Council voted today to override former Mayor Adams’ last-minute veto of legislation to support street vendors, including Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams' bill to create a Division of Street Vendor Assistance. Adams vetoed the bill, and many others, on December 31, hours before he left office. With this override vote, the street vendor reform package will become law.
Under the Public Advocate’s legislation, Intro 408-A, the new Division of Street Vendor Assistance, housed within the Department of Small Business Services, will be charged with providing training, outreach, and education to all food vendors and general vendors regarding entrepreneurship and compliance with all applicable local laws, rules, and regulation. This will give street vendors access to many of the same tools afforded to other small businesses.
Watch street vendors explain the challenges they face and the need for this package.
“Street vendors provide some of the most affordable options for New Yorkers facing an increasingly unaffordable city, and by vetoing the street vendor reform package on his way out the door, the former mayor denied New York City's smallest businesses the support they need to survive and thrive thrive," said Public Advocate Jumaane D. Williams on the vote. “In speaking with vendors about the barriers they face, it’s clear we can do more, and an office dedicated to street vendor assistance – which my bill creates – will help these entrepreneurs navigate obstacles to licensing, inconsistency in enforcement, and regulations that make it near-impossible to operate in a successful and sustained way. I thank the new Speaker and Council for voting to override the former mayor's callous, careless vetoes and bringing about the progress he aimed to deny."
In December, the Public Advocate released a review of the street vending industry, Pushing Forward: Legislative Reforms to Fix NYC’s Street Vending System, which documented the barriers vendors face and provided recommendations on how to support the city’s smallest businesses while enacting regulations that help make operations more safe and orderly.
In the review, he urged passage of not only his own bill, Intro 408-A but a full package of legislation including on the issue. In total, the Council voted to pass three bills on the issue, and voted again today to override vetoes of them, including: Int. No. 431-B – which would reform NYC’s street vending system to balance incentives with enforcement by requiring increased enforcement personnel, adding new mandatory suspension and revocation license language, and issuing licenses to bring existing vendors into the regulatory system. Int. No. 1251-A – which would authorize the department to issue more applications each year, so that up to the fully permitted number supervisory licenses are issued every twelve months.
In addition to the establishment of the Division of Street Vendor Assistance, the Public Advocate’s bill will require the commissioner of small business services to update the department’s programs to facilitate services specifically for street vendor small businesses.
Street vending continues to be an economic anchor for many New Yorkers, as is a particularly important cornerstone for many immigrants, people of color, and military veterans to successfully operate the city’s smallest businesses.
With over 20,000 street vendors operating in the city, change needs to be made to ensure NYC’s smallest businesses can thrive rather than face an unsafe system that too often criminalizes this economic engine of our city rather than advance the opportunity and diversity it presents. In 2024 alone, the NYPD and Department of Sanitation issued nearly double the amount of vending-related tickets issued in 2023, and five times higher than the number of tickets issued in 2019.
In recent years, the street vendor industry has been subject to new obstacles including the Adams administration’s approach to enforcement. Their convoluted and contradictory approach led to greater confusion and potential for violations and overenforcement. Honest merchants have felt harassed, without a pathway to access the proper business licenses, sometimes being unfairly arrested, and without adequate resources or clear regulations to follow.
Overriding the former mayor’s vetoes now paves the way for progress.