In yet another rebuke of Mayor Eric Adams, the City Council on Wednesday voted to override his vetoes of legislation to decriminalize unlicensed street vending and raise the minimum wage for grocery store delivery workers.
Needing a two-thirds majority of the 51-member council, the body barely eked out an override of Mayor Adams’ veto for a bill that would eliminate misdemeanors for street vendors who operate without a license — with a 35-to-9 vote and three abstentions. It also voted to revive a bill that would raise the minimum wage for grocery delivery workers to $21.44 by a 39-to-8 vote; and another to strengthen their workplace protections by a 40-to-7 vote.
Council members have framed the first bill as a way to limit street vendors’ — 96% of whom are immigrants — interactions with law enforcement amid President Trump’s crackdown on those who are undocumented.
The latter two would require grocery delivery apps like Instacart to extend the same minimum wage increase and workplace protections to their workers that are currently afforded to food deliveristas. The companies would be required to provide protections like access to bathrooms, fire safety materials, and insulated delivery bags. The changes would be regulated by the city Department of Consumer and Worker Protection.
The council approved all three bills by supermajorities earlier this summer. The mayor then vetoed them shortly thereafter.
City Council speaker says Adams’ vetoes ‘harmful’
During a news conference before the vote on Sept. 10, City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams said her body’s action is intended to defend working New Yorkers from the mayor’s “harmful” vetoes.
“The labor of working people must be valued and protected from exploitation and the extreme anti-working-class agenda of the Trump administration,” Speaker Adams said. “That’s why we’re here today, to indicate that we will override the mayor’s vetoes of three critical bills that would protect safety and opportunity for working New Yorkers.”
The council’s overrides were the latest of several actions it has taken over the past couple of years to rebuff the mayor. They are further evidence that the relationship between the council and the Adams administration has broken down.
Adams issued the vetoes amid his long-shot bid for reelection.
The speaker also noted that the mayor did an about-face on all three bills, issuing his vetoes after initially supporting them. However, City Hall disputes that it supported the bills.
In dismissing the street vending bill, Adams argued that it removes the NYPD’s ability to enforce a persistent quality of life issue. City Council Member Mercedes Narcisse (D-Brooklyn), who voted against the override, argued during the vote that decriminalizing street vendors would hurt small businesses.
‘Bad legislation,’ says Mastro
Following the vote, First Deputy Mayor Randy Mastro called the bill a piece of “bad legislation.”
“This is bad legislation in the guise of decriminalizing illegal vending; it effectively legalizes it by providing no real penalty for doing it,” Mastro told reporters. “That’s bad for our city. It’s not fair to all the legal small businesses and licensed vendors, most of whom are themselves immigrants.”
The legislation replaces misdemeanors for unlicensed street vendors with civil penalties and fines.
During the press conference, City Council Member Shekar Krishnan (D-Queens), who sponsored the street vendor bill, claimed criminalizing the practice puts undocumented immigrants in danger of getting caught up in Trump’s mass deportation push. The lawmaker contended that Adams shot down the legislation because of his alliance with Trump around immigration enforcement.
“We cannot be subjecting immigrant New Yorkers to jail time and the drastic immigration consequences,” Krishnan said. “We will stand against the mayor’s, yet again, another attempt to collaborate and advance the anti-immigration agenda of Donald Trump.”
However, when asked for specific examples of immigrant street vendors getting arrested and deported, Speaker Adams said the move is a preventative measure.
When it comes to Mayor Adams’ vetoes for the grocery workers measures, he claimed the action was necessary to protect vulnerable consumers — such as seniors and those with disabilities — from having to pay more for grocery deliveries. But the Daily News reported last month that Adams vetoed the two bills at Mastro’s urging following an aggressive lobbying campaign by both Instacart and Amazon.
Instacart slightly backpedaled on its opposition to the bills after Adams rejected them. However, the company said it only supports the minimum wage bill for the time that workers spend delivering an order, not the time they spend on the app waiting for one.
Before casting her vote, Council Member Sandy Nurse (D-Brooklyn), who sponsored the wage increase bill, charged that Mayor Adams sided with Instacart — a $13 billion company — in vetoing the bills.
“All we’re asking for is $21-an-hour, which is barely enough to survive in this city,” Nurse said. “But even that was too much for a $13 billion company, and the mayor sided with them. He has abandoned working people and immigrant workers.”
