San Francisco city employees tasked with enforcing the city’s street vending rules have received so many death threats, they have been issued bulletproof vests.
Public Works inspectors, who check food carts and whether street vendors have proper permits, have been subjected to an increased number of threats and assaults, prompting the safety measure, according to the San Francisco Chronicle.
Public Works spokesperson Rachel Gordon told the publication her staffers have been “pushed, bumped, [had] items thrown at them.
“The verbal attacks remain frequent,” Gordon said. She added some of the inspectors have been punched in the stomach and their lives threatened.
The city has cracked down on street vendors after the fencing of stolen goods became more commonplace in busy downtown areas including UN Plaza and the areas around Mission and Market streets — also known as areas where drug deals take place.
City officials are cracking down on street vending after Supervisor Hillary Ronen announced on Tuesday a complete ban will begin next month on Mission Street.
Meanwhile, sources told The Post that some of the street vendors and fencers are “smash-and-grabbers” who steal everything from medication to toiletries, soaps and shampoos at stores like Walgreens and turn around to sell them for a quick buck on Market Street and other areas where homelessness is rampant.
San Francisco Police Chief Bill Scott acknowledged the city’s growing fencing and permitting issues and attacks on inspectors.
“They have been subject to attacks, verbal and physical assaults,” Scott told local ABC7 KGO. “So it really makes it difficult to do their jobs.”
The San Francisco Police Department was awarded $15.3 million in state grants in September and promised to run a series of “blitz” operations to curb retail theft, but fencing in the black market continues to be a problem.
However, some community members have also taken issue with the city inspectors after an incident earlier this month when a Public Works employee was caught on video pushing a street vendor’s cart to the ground at the busy tourist area of Fisherman’s Wharf.
In the short video clip, an inspector wearing a bright yellow vest chased down hot dog vendor Juan Carlos Ramirez. The unidentified city worker grabbed Ramirez’s cart and pushed it to the ground, sending hot dogs, onions, bell peppers and buns flying all over the street.
“I was embarrassed,” Ramirez told local ABC7 KGO in Spanish. “It was humiliating.”
Some street vendors said if their cart is confiscated by Public Works inspectors for not having permits, they have to pay a $300 fine, which many of them can’t afford — raising questions about whom they are actually working for and who gets the profits.
Meanwhile, Ronen and her staff said the continued threats to inspectors is “the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
“What we have seen over the last year and a half is Mission Street really being flooded with large-scale fencing organizations,” Santiago Lerma, Ronen’s legislative aide, told ABC7.
“Our Public Works inspectors are now wearing bulletproof vests while they are walking the streets and they are escorted by police.”
