Chief of Patrol Jeffrey Maddrey, Police Department: Good evening everyone. Members of the media, thank you for being here. My name is Chief Jeff Maddrey. I'm the chief of patrol for the NYPD, and I have the honor to stand here with the mayor of the City of New York, the Honorable Eric Adams, our commanding officer of Patrol Borough Queens South, Assistant Chief Kevin Williams, and Deputy Inspector Brian O'Sullivan, who's the commanding officer of the Traffic Enforcement Division. Also standing with us are elected officials from Queens, our commissioners. I want to thank them for not only being here, but along with the community, bringing this issue to our attention.
Chief Maddrey: So we are here to highlight the recent work of the NYPD, our officers and our traffic enforcement agents during Operation Heavy Duty Enforcement, Heavy Duty for short. Targeting illegal overnight parking of commercial vehicles in residential neighborhoods of Southern Queens. New York City parking rules prohibit these vehicles from parking overnight on residential streets from 9:00 pm at night to 5:00 am the following morning, and that's seven days a week. This is a multifaceted effort consisting of three teams utilizing heavy tow operations, along with applying boots to vehicles, as well as issuing summons for the parking infractions.
Chief Maddrey: This operation spans across several NYPD commands, bureaus and other city agencies. This enforcement action is a direct result of community concerns and community complaints. And on a personal note, I spend a lot of time in this neighborhood and I've noticed personally how the residential blocks have been inundated with these large vehicles that should not be parking overnight.
Chief Maddrey: These vehicles negatively impact our communities here. The residents reached out and of course the NYPD responded. Our department to date took action. In the first five days of this endeavor, which started on Monday, August 15th, and went to Friday, August 19th, we issued 635 summons, we attached 89 boots to vehicles, and we towed 55 illegally parked vehicles, some of them are what you see right here in the backdrop behind us. I'd like to take a moment to thank the owners of this facility here in supporting us in this endeavor, allowing us to use this facility to store these vehicles and use it as our operation center.
Chief Maddrey: We're committed here at the NYPD to improving the quality of life of every New Yorker in every New York City neighborhood. We will do this in close collaboration with the residents, our other leaders here, people who work in our neighborhoods, and visitors to our city. It is very critical that the NYPD listens to the people we serve, and this is just the latest example of how we're working together to make New York City safer and better. So, now I have the honor here to introduce our mayor, the Honorable Eric Adams.
Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you, chief.
Chief Maddrey: Yes, sir.
Mayor Adams: Thanks so much. Our partners here, Queens Borough President Donovan Richards, Councilwoman Selvena Brooks-Powers, Councilwoman Nantasha Williams, Councilwoman Linda Lee, our civic groups and organizations that are here. This is a real problem. During the campaign trail, I recall the borough president talking about the park areas, Springfield Boulevard, parts of the Bronx, where these trucks are lining the neighborhoods. Some parks, you cannot even see outside the park because trucks are lined up. We committed that we were going to tackle this problem head on, and we knew that it was going to take some coordination. We're clear that many of the truck drivers now have to take the necessary rest, mandated rest by federal law. We understand that. We are partnering with a combination of city agencies to deal with this long term issue. But in the interim, we have used social media and direct interaction and communication to tell the drivers you cannot park in residential communities.
Mayor Adams: It's not lost on us. This type of parking is not happening in affluent areas. You are not going to go in affluent parts of the city and see these 18 wheelers parked out front and it goes without enforcement. This is a residential community. They deserve the same level of quality of life that we give to other parts of the city. That is how we're going to give to every part of the city. They have been raising these concerns, these elected officials, even prior to being elected, and just community advocates, they have been raising these concerns over and over again. And those concerns have fallen on deaf ears. January 1st, 2022, a mayor came in that not only listens, but he responds. We believe in GSD, get stuff done. And we are getting it done tonight. We get it done during the day, we get it done during the afternoon. This is a problem that has been in place far too long.
Mayor Adams: So tonight, you're seeing the vehicles that were towed here. We're going to go to a location and show how we either tow, or we put on the boot, to send a clear message that this is not going to continue in the communities in this city. We are proud of what the Police Department is doing from everything from paper plates, to the illegal ATVs and dirt bikes on our roads, to targeted enforcement of noise complaints, to targeted enforcement of disruptive behavior in our city.
Mayor Adams: New Yorkers are stating we want to live in a city where quality of life is considered as paramount, no matter where you live and no matter what block you live on. That is what we are doing. That's why we're out here at 9:30 pm, to look at those who are breaking the law, that are parking on our city streets during the hours that they're not supposed to be parking. This is not a hit on those low wage workers who are driving trucks. It is a hit on ensuring we get to quality of life that we deserve.
Mayor Adams: So I want to, again, thank my electeds. And I want to turn it over to our borough president. I've been seeing a lot of you, Borough President Donovan Richards, and have our elected officials say a few words because you have played a crucial role in pointing out this issue and stayed in that partnership between my office, City Hall, our agencies and our elected officials. Borough President Richards said something today with the speed bump problem he had. He says, "Your agencies are responding". We want to be known as a city agency and administration that we respond to the needs and the cause of our local elected officials. I'm going to turn it over to Queens Borough President Donovan Richards.
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Mayor Adams: Councilwoman.
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Mayor Adams: Councilwoman Lee.
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Mayor Adams: Thank you. Councilwoman Williams.
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Mayor Adams: Thank you. Get our task force leader. You worked on this, fought for this.
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Mayor Adams: Great. Love it. Thank you. Bring this to our attention. Open to a few questions before we get to work.
Question: [Inaudible.]
Mayor Adams: We want to find easier locations for them while we are working out this long-term problem, but there are parking facilities around the city where they can park that can accommodate trucks. But when you say it's easier just to park in a residential area, because everyone is ignoring it, then you are ignoring the possibility. They're allowing their convenience to inconvenience everyday residents. So there are places around the city that we can look at and then we, as a city, can find locations such as the Marine Terminal in Brooklyn and Sunset Park. We can look at potential using spaces in a Navy Yard. There are other sites that are more suitable to park trucks than on a block where you have residential communities.
Mayor Adams: Yes, you can. Selvena Brooks-Powers.
City Council Member Selvena Brooks-Powers: So I just want to also add that the task force and collaboration with our Council offices and the NEDC have met recently with the Port Authority in terms of the Southeast Queens community to look and explore other solutions possibly on airport, where there's a lot of land that's there. So we are working with the city agencies that are working to get it done so that we can find that happy medium. Thank you.
Question: [Inaudible.]
Mayor Adams: Good question. How much worse has it gotten?
Bill Perkins: I can tell you from Southeastern Queens in my neighborhood, Brookville Park, four or five years ago, there would be two or three trucks parked. So it would just be a matter of just calling up the 105th precinct and then working through that. Now, there're 30 trucks parked. And in some locations, if you go down Springfield Boulevard, you'll see 50 trucks parked. We had a task force member actually take down the license plate number of 50 trucks, and we filed 311 complaints. So it is not just aromatically increased, it's exponentially increased.
Mayor Adams: Want to also thank our amazing DOT commissioner for being here, Ydanis Rodriguez, for the coordination of this initiative. Other questions?
Question: Just one more.
Mayor Adams: Yes.
Question: We see these commercial trucks. Have you noticed an uptick in RVs and residential vehicles?
Mayor Adams: Ladies, one of you ladies want to tackle that one about council fees?
City Council Member Nantasha Williams: The simple answer is yes. So again, one of the operations we do in our office with the precincts directly is tag and tow operations, usually for derelict or abandoned vehicles. That has also exponentially increased. So, the short answer is yes.
Queens Borough President Donovan Richards: Let me just add on as the councilwoman alluded to, and as you alluded to Mr. Mayor, the convenience part. I'm being anecdotal here. But some of the folks who drive these trucks, and I think the NYPD could give you more info on that, live right here. So, it's convenient for them to also park and go into their home and that's not right. You should be responsible to your community. Your community has fought hard to become homeowners, to preserve the quality of life that we have. It's unfortunate that we have people here who also are a part of the problem as well. So if you're a part of problem, you're definitely not a part of the solution. You need to also, for those of you who listening out there, we want to work with you, but you cannot use our streets as a parking lot.
Mayor Adams: Okay. Look at these trucks, they sneak and say, what is Eric doing over here?
Borough President Richards: This is where they normally park.
Mayor Adams: All right. So we're going to go to one of the locations. All right, ready to go. You can follow us, those who want to be a part of this.