Time really is money — especially when it comes to the city Department of Health’s ticket blitz on merchants.
A health inspector slapped halal cart vendor Ahmed Hassan with a $1,000 fine because it took him too long — two minutes — to find his permit while he was cooking, he told The Post.
Now the Queens man, who has a young son, fears he could lose his permit — and his livelihood.
“It’s too much! I can’t afford it,” he said. “I can’t pay a ticket for $1,000. I have a lot of bills. I never heard somebody get a $1,000 ticket.”
He’s fighting the city to get the violation tossed.
Hassan was prepping for the lunch rush on the corner of Duane Street and Broadway on April 18 when the inspector asked for his permit.
Hassan, whipping up lamb and chicken, told the inspector it was in the cart.
But the official left after two minutes, returning hours later with the ticket for the maximum fine — although Hassan, 40, was holding his city permit at that point, the vendor said.
The violation says Hassan was preparing food without a permit or prior inspection report on hand.
“Office had to be contacted in order to obtain permit information,” it says.
The inspector skipped four fine options, from $25 to $250, and wrote in the top choice of $1,000.
Hassan unsuccessfully challenged the ticket in May with the city’s Environmental Control Board and is preparing an appeal with an attorney from the Street Vendor Project, an advocacy group lobbying City Council to lower maximum fines for vendors.
The next hearing has not been scheduled.
Hassan’s attorney, Matthew Shapiro, said the cart was displaying a decal indicating it was a valid city vending operation when the inspector arrived.
“This is a clear example of an excessive and arbitrary fine designed to punish small-business owners who do not make enough income to afford this type of penalty,” Shapiro said.
The Bloomberg administration has so far received $378,446 from food-cart vendor fines this year, compared with more than $1.1 million last year and nearly $1.7 million in 2010.
The number of tickets issued is at 12,702 this year, compared with 18,641 last year. In 2010, it was a record-high 20,224.