Over the past month, city Department of Sanitation (DSNY) officers have cracked down on unlicensed street vending in the Bronx’s Allerton neighborhood.
The bustling Allerton commercial strip of Allerton Avenue between White Plains Avenue and Boston Road is home to some 200 small businesses and a few chain stores alongside a handful of street vendors, who hawk everything from yams and papayas to jewelry and African hats.
But when DSNY came after Victor Martinez’s produce stall that has been a neighborhood fixture since 2011, many residents — and even other vendors — were outraged. On Oct. 17, Martinez’s stand was shut down — and all his merchandise confiscated — for the fourth time in a month.
DSNY issued 485 violations between April 1, when it took over enforcement from city Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, and Sept. 14, according to a Sept. 27 letter to city Comptroller Brad Lander from the mayor’s office obtained via a Freedom of information Law (FOIL) request by the Bronx Times.
A jewelry vendor on Allerton Avenue, who requested anonymity for fear of enforcement backlash, told the Bronx Times the recent confiscations have been “really devastating.”
“They don’t want us to sell, but they don’t give us licenses to sell,” he said.
Martinez was far from the first vendor bust in the Bronx. In 2021, community members and elected officials slammed city workers who shut down a produce stand at Pelham Parkway and White Plains Road and threw all the food onto the back of a garbage truck.
The Allerton produce stand is a neighborhood staple of sorts, operated by Martinez, 59, who lives nearby on Eastchester Road. He sets up under the 2 train at Allerton Avenue and White Plains Road, in an area where the sidewalk widens out. He has three or four employees and is open daily from 7 a.m.-7 p.m.
Business is good, Martinez told the Bronx Times in a phone call. Thanks to his prime location — which brings lots of…
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