A hotly contested bill that would eliminate New York’s longstanding limits on street-vending licenses is gaining momentum in the City Council, heartening supporters in the immigrant-heavy vending community but stoking a new wave of anxiety among brick-and-mortar retailers.
After appearing to slow-walk it for more than a year, the council on Tuesday will hold a hearing on the bill, which would raise and eventually abolish the city’s limits on both food and general vending licenses. A confluence of political factors has helped propel the cap-lifting bill, along with other proposed reforms that would eliminate criminal penalties for illegal selling and create a city office to aid vendors.
“This is a major step forward in this perennial debate around street vending in New York City,” said Pierina Sanchez, a Bronx councilwoman who sponsored the cap-lifting bill. “It’s always sort of shocking when there’s a major step in the direction of reform because there are such strong feelings on every side of this issue.”
The number of general licenses, required to legally sell merchandise, has been capped at just 853 since the 1970s, while the number of food vending licenses remains in the low thousands even after a 2021 law required the city to make 445 additional permits available each year. Waitlists for both general and food licenses number about 12,000 and 7,000 people, respectively, and the general-vending waitlist has been closed for years. Those limits have created a black market in which vendors pay exorbitant costs to rent permits, while thousands of other sellers simply operate illegally on streets and sidewalks without paying business taxes or getting regular health inspections.
Sanchez’s bill, first introduced in December 2023, would let the city issue hundreds of new food and general vending licenses each year for five years, then lift both caps entirely starting in 2029. Rather than creating an influx of new vendors, supporters say the bill would bring existing vendors into the light and help the city regulate them.
“The floodgates are already open,” said Mohamed Attia, managing director of the Street Vendor Project, which has campaigned for the reforms. “There are already so many vendors out there selling without the proper license. What this bill would do is ensure people are getting into the system, receiving the proper license and getting training.”
But the measures have drawn strong opposition from store owners and business groups, who say street vendors crowd sidewalks, create unsanitary conditions and unfairly draw customers away from brick-and-mortar retailers. Erin Piscopink, co-chair of the New York City Business Improvement District Association, said in a statement that the group “opposes the idea of adding an unlimited number of vendor licenses to an already broken vending system” and argued the city should focus instead on better implementing previous reforms.
Still, there are signs of a possible compromise. Sanchez and her allies plan to amend the cap-lifting bill to step up enforcement by increasing the number of Sanitation Department personnel assigned to street vendors as the number of licenses rises, and to create processes for suspending and eventually revoking licenses for vendors who break health or safety rules.
Those proposed changes, shared with Crain’s, emerged from closed-door meetings between council leaders and business groups. Business groups expressed support for the amendments, sources said, though they remain generally opposed to the bill itself.
Supporters of the reforms told Crain’s they were hopeful that even Mayor Eric Adams’ business-friendly administration might support the reforms as a way to tighten regulations on existing vendors. But City Hall spokesman Zachary Nosenchuk flatly rejected the proposals in a statement — and included a dig at Adams’ political rival Public Advocate Jumaane Williams, who supports the package.
“New York City’s street vendors are an important part of our city’s culture and economy, and the Adams administration works with these small businesses to help them obtain proper permits,” Nosenchuk said. “But fully lifting the cap on vendor permits would lead to congested and disorderly streets, which would inevitably affect the storefronts of small businesses on those same streets. Unlike Jumaane Williams, the Adams administration considers the needs and concerns of all New Yorkers — which is why we oppose this inconsiderate legislation.”
Political intrigue
The council held a hearing more than a year ago on other bills that would relax penalties and let vendors place their pushcarts further from the curb, but avoided action on Sanchez’s more controversial bill. Representatives for Council Speaker Adrienne Adams said it took months of meetings with retailers and vendors’ groups before the council was ready to hold a hearing on Sanchez’s bill, and groups like the Street Vendor Project have held large-scale marches to push the council to act.
But insiders pointed to some political factors that may have also helped grease the wheels. Several lawmakers who are expected to run for City Council speaker next year have roles in the vendor debate and could benefit from the political support of influential immigrants’ rights groups like Make the Road New York, which is backing the package. Manhattan Councilwoman Julie Menin signed off on Tuesday’s hearing as chair of the relevant committee; Amanda Farías of the Bronx is pushing a new bill targeting food-licenses and is a sponsor of the other reform bills; and Brooklyn’s Crystal Hudson is also sponsoring the bills and signed up to speak at a Tuesday rally for them.
Then there is Speaker Adams herself, who controls the council’s legislative process and is running for mayor with a ranked-choice endorsement from Make the Road. Another mayoral candidate, Comptroller Brad Lander, is slated to speak at Tuesday’s rally on the City Hall steps ahead of the hearing.
President Donald Trump’s aggressive deportation policies have also added urgency to the discussion, with supporters of the reforms arguing that they would help immigrant vendors avoid unnecessary interactions with law enforcement.
Pro-vendor groups say they have more arguments up their sleeve. The Independent Budget Office estimated last month that lifting the cap could gain the city $59 million in tax revenues if all waitlisted vendors received licenses and began paying taxes. (IBO offered a previous ceiling of $17 million in a report last year, but now says that figure was erroneously low.)
And the Street Vendor Project will tout an open letter supporting the bills signed by buzzy brick-and-mortar restaurants such as Cervo’s on the Lower East Side, Bonnie’s in Williamsburg and Rolo’s in Ridgewood.
Supporters and opponents agree, at least, that the current regime is not working.
“We want it to work for the business community, we want it to work for the residents, we want it to work for everyone,” said Attia. “Sadly, right now what exists is not helping anyone.”
