THAT’S JUST SMALL: SoHo street vendor Alessane Fall was fined $1,000 (top left) for his cart being 1 inch higher than its 5-foot limit — and got another fine that claimed he was 2 inches too close to a local business. (
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The priciest real estate in New York is just a few inches of SoHo.
A street vendor hawking cellphone cases was slapped with $2,250 in fines for selling from a table that stood 1 inch too high and 2 inches too close to the nearest store entrance.
Alessane Fall — who lives in The Bronx with his wife and six children — intends to fight the three tickets he received from the same officer on Sept. 20 because, he says, city regulations are crippling entrepreneurs.
“I don’t know why the city is giving out tickets, but we’re here just to work, to feed our family, make sure our family goes to school,” Fall said.
“We come all the way from Africa looking for a better country.”
He’ll appear before a city administrative law judge next month.
One of the tickets states Fall’s cart was an inch over the 5-foot height limit for vending carts — a violation that costs up to $1,000.
“Defendant was observed with a vending cart taller than 5 feet — 5 feet, 1 inch,” the ticket reads.
When Fall measured his table for The Post, it came in at 4 feet, 10 inches — but a clip holding down some merchandise pushed it to 5 feet, 1 inch.
The police officer who fined Fall wrote a second ticket claiming the cart was 2 inches shy of the required 20 feet that’s supposed to separate a vendor from the nearest store entrance.
Fall insists he was more than 20 feet away.
And the third summons indicates Fall was peddling goods on the sidewalk instead of his table — another allegation he denies.
Fall said the officer grew hostile because Fall videotaped the exchange on his phone and took pictures of the cop.
The officer said he would write a ticket “no matter what,” Fall said. “He tells me, ‘No matter what you do, even if you are right, you have 20 feet, everything — I’m going to write you a ticket,’ ” the vendor claimed.
The NYPD did not respond to a request for comment.
Fall’s attorney, Sean Basinski, director of the small-business advocacy organization Street Vendor Project, said Fall’s ticket is the most egregious example he’s ever seen of an excessive punishment for a vendor.
“Why are we spending tax dollars to write a ticket for being 1 inch too high, if he was?” Basinski said. “And then why are we fining him $1,000?
“It’s this kind of ticky-tacky thing — never giving vendors the benefit of the doubt.” And so this is one of the most ridiculous or blatant kind of recent examples of that.”
Basinski’s organization is pushing legislation that would lower the maximum fine vendors can receive for minor infractions to $250 from $1,000.
Another bill would subject vendors to increased penalties only if they commit the same infraction more than once — currently the fines increase every time a violation is written, regardless of what type.
The bills have not moved out of the Council’s Consumer Affairs Committee since April and Speaker Christine Quinn evaded when asked about it last week.
The Street Vendor Project says the city issues and average 25,552 tickets to vendors annually, and dismisses an average of 5,672 each year.
The most common fines, according to the organization, are vending too close to a crosswalk or subway, failing to keep all items in or under a pushcart and maintaining food at an improper temperature.
“We urge Speaker Quinn to call a vote on the two bills to lower the fines on licensed vendors,” Basinski said.