Fourth graders have been learning about the issues facing street vendors. They have visited with: lawyers and vendors at the Urban Justice Center, street vendors in the financial district and Washington Square Park, a lawyer from the City Council, City Council members, and representatives from the Speaker of the City Council’s office. All of these experiences are allowing students the opportunity to explore a complex issue from a variety of perspectives and to experience the political process first hand. Below are some of their descriptions:

After a visit to the Urban Justice Center, one student offered his opinion:

“There are pros and cons to the issues facing street vendors, but I think the city should give out more permits. One pro is that food carts are cheaper and faster than restaurants. A second pro is you can get all kinds of interesting food from around the world. One con used by the City Council is there will be too many street vendors and the city will be too crowded. The second con used by people who don’t want more street vendors is restaurants could go out of business because of there being too many places to get food for a lower price. In my opinion street vendors are a part of history because In the 1900’s that was how some immigrants got their start in America, and now that is how some modern immigrants get their start! We could write letters to the city council to tell them that they should lower the price of permits and ask them to give out more permits for vendors who are new immigrants.

Next up, students decided to write letters to the Speaker of the City Council, Melissa Mark-Viverito:

Dear Melissa Mark-Viverito,
My name is Beckett Finn Fox. I go to school at LREI. The reason I am writing this letter is because people need more permits for street vending. A lot of immigrants can only do jobs that don’t need any qualifications, and this is one of them. They need that permit to make money. Also, street vendors are a part of history. For example, there have been street vendors in New York for over 100 years. Also, New York is famous for having food from around the world and street vendors help provide that food. You may think that the streets will overflow if there are more vendors, but they will not because not everyone will want to become a street vendor. The reason for this is because some people have jobs that pay more money.
From,
Beckett

Then Robert Newman, the Chief Counsel for the Speaker of the City Council visited our classroom to answer some questions.

Some samples of their thank you letters and what they learned during that dialogue:

Dear Mr. Newman,

Thank you for taking time out of your schedule to meet us and talk about street vendor problems. I learned that there IS actually a plan for how to let more immigrants be legal food vendors. I am still wondering why there is an irremovable cap but other than that you answered all my questions about the subject. But the only solution to the problems you mentioned was to lift the cap.

Sincerely Dennis Steel

Dear Mr. Newman,

Thank you so much for taking time off your day to talk to us. I learned a lot from the conversation that we had. One thing I learned was that while figuring out how to solve the food vendor problem, it’s not easy for anyone. It’s not easy for the vendors, it’s not easy for the restaurant owners/workers, it’s not easy for the council members/lawyers, and it’s not easy for the rest of the people. I was surprised when you said this problem has been going on for around 30 years. I also think that the solution that you said the city council is probably going to chose is a very good solution and that’s probably the one I would pick out of all.

Sincerely,
Cassidy Moskowitz

Dear Mr. Newman,

Thank you for taking time out of your schedule to come talk to our grade about laws and food vendors. I learned that you can’t just propose an idea on your own, you need a sponsor. I am surprised that the people you work with get to decide if there are more permits or not.
I feel like there should be more permits because when people become a food vendor it is like a start to a restaurant but cheaper. If restaurants are complaining they should become food vendors so that they can see how hard it is.

Sincerely,
Grace MacGillivray

Dear Mr. Newman,

Thank you for taking time away on your busy day to help us discuss and get deeper into the real problems immigrants and food vendors face. I learned a lot about food vending and immigration I found it interesting that many immigrants came to america without documents. But that means they have to come from canada or a bordering country. It surprises me that restaurants are the most common business to go bankrupt. I agree with what Eli said about lifting the cap sloley. Do you need training to become a food vendor?
Sincerely,
Jett

Dear Robert Newman,

Thank you for taking your time to help us understand that there are good things and bad things of having street vendors. I learned that street vendors could put some restaurants out of business. I was surprised of that because people would rather go to restaurants, but at lunch rush they need a quicker way of getting food so they go to the street vendor. I don’t really think it’s the street vendors fault if people go to them and not the restaurant I think it’s their decision. Also the street vendors pay a lot of money to get the groceries and they have a routine and if they don’t make enough money for the next day they can’t be a street vendor anymore.

From,

Zach

Dear Mr. Newman,

Thank you so much for coming in to our classroom and teaching us about the New York City Council. I learned from your visit that the people on the Council cared more about the street vendor problem than I thought. What surprised me about your visit is that I found out that not all people in our grade want to help the food vendors. One thing I thought was a good solution would be to lower the permit price a tiny bit a year.

Sincerely,

Verity K. Berthelsen

Dear Mr. Newman,

I would like to thank you so much for taking time out of your day to come talk to us about important issues. I learned so much about not only you and your job but also your look on this topic. One interesting thing I learned about is the process of a bill. Even though we already read the flowcharts you told us so much more about each step. One thing that surprised me was what you said about if you lift the cap, the black market will lower the price. I am not saying I disagree with you, in fact, I strongly agree with you, I just never thought about it that way. I really agree with you (and Elijah) that I think we should lift the cap a little and see how that goes. If it goes well we lift the cap, if it doesn’t we don’t. I still do have a question though: How long does it take for the whole bill process to happen? Thank you so much again.

Sincerely,
Violet Zimmerman Wexler

Then on April 6th, fourth graders went to City Hall to deliver their letters to the Speaker. Here are some reports from that experience:

“Oh how exciting today was! Today the fourth graders protested at City Hall. We were fighting to lift the cap on street vending permits. Some were holding up signs and chanting, these were the activists. Some were taking notes and interviewing classmates, these were the reporters. Some were observing, watching the every move, these were the students.

Once in awhile a city council member would come out of the building and ask what we wanted changed, what wasn’t right in our point of view. One kid would explain what exactly we are fighting for. He/she would either give advice on the problem or agree and cheer us on. Some of the council members were very surprised to see kids protesting about a problem that pertains to adults. I hope with that they will understand that is a problem that needs to be handled with, pronto.

We protested and kept protesting as more and more people saw us. Some of us handed out flyers as for the people that passed by to know what exactly the problem was. Even though the activists were the ones with the signs, almost all 4th graders chanted, either “What do we want? PERMITS! When do we want them? NOW!” or “Lift the cap, lift the cap!” or “Venders count to!” the list goes on.

As we protested, observed, and took notes we noticed a lot of things around us. We also saw other protests going on at the same time as ours. One of them was grandmas against guns and there were characters from Times Square protesting because the City Council doesn’t like them to be doing their job any more. Some of the other protesters joined in with us to help us kids get a bit louder.

Once the protest was pretty much over we headed to the real City Hall and delivered our letters and get a picture. One of the people who worked in City Hall didn’t like that we were doing this but a Senior Advisor to the Speaker named Pedro Julio Serrano was nice enough to let us take one picture. We also couldn’t hand deliver the letters so he had to personally take them to Melissa Mark-Viverito. Some of us were disappointed but thankfully they are getting delivered!

Hopefully soon enough the City Council will really focus on this problem and fix it as soon as possible. We kids tried very hard to make a statement, so did the vendors who joined us. I hope the City Council sees that even kids are getting into this. I hope the vendors get their rights, we all do.”

“The subway stopped. All fourth grade walked all the way to a big building titled 250 Broadway. Once they got there they stopped. The fourth grade raised their protesting signs and started to yell “WHAT DO WE WANT? PERMITS!!” The fourth grade was protesting to City Council about lifting the cap. Lifting the cap in this case means more permits.

But it wasn’t just the fourth graders, some food vendors were helping too. (This protest is about their jobs.) after some time of protesting a member from the city council walked out of the building and towards the fourth grade. The man explained how he was on there side and how he will try his best to help the food vendors.

After the men left the fourth grade students kept protesting. It was nearly time to leave they crossed the street and a group of people dressed up were protesting to, but not for the same thing. They were protesting because some people don’t want them (dressed up people) in times square any more.

Afterwards the fourth grade had to deliver the letters to the city council. The letters were about the problem with the food vendors. Who knows what will happen next, will they lift the cap or leave it?”

“Today I went on a field trip with the rest of the fourth grade to City Hall. We went because we are learning about food vendors and their difficulties. We left at around 10:00am. Before we left some of us made signs to protest. The reason only some of us made signs was because there were three groups of kids, the kids who went as students, the ones who went as journalists, and the ones who went as activists. Most kids chose to go as activists. The kids who made the signs were the ones who were going as activists. We took the subway to get there and when we got there we talked to a woman who works at City Hall. We also met a few vendors. We made letters for the head of the City Council a few weeks ago (Melissa-Mark Viverito) about food vending. Two of us got to deliver all the letters we wrote for her. We all wrote letters but not all of us wanted to get ours delivered to her. It was really cool to know that the head of City Council was going to read them. We also protested and handed out flyers to the people walking by us. Some kids didn’t protest because they’re not really on the same side as the food vendors. We were VERY loud! There were other protesters across the street. There was one group of grandmas who were protesting against guns at schools. There were other people that were protesting too. A couple of people that are part of the City Council came down to talk to us. We were protesting right outside of City Hall and there were many different people walking by, there were some cops right outside, and there were different types of stores too. Then we went across the street and handed out more flyers and protested even more. A little while after we went across the street it started pouring rain but luckily I had an umbrella with me. By that time it was almost lunch time for us at school so we had to hurry back. I think one of the reasons I liked this trip so much was because we’ve never done anything like it before. We’ve never protested, we’ve never handed out flyers, and it was just a whole new AWESOME experience for us. I had so much fun on this trip and it was definitely one of my favorites!”

“A man who was a member of the City Council, came up to the group of children and started talking to them. He was saying how he agreed that this was a problem in NYC and that it is part of what makes New York special.

The students were chanting for a little while now, but then it started drizzling. The signs dripped and the marker spread. They tried to keep on chanting but then it started to pour outside and they got souked. They moved, now closer to where they were going to deliver some letters to Melissa Mark-Viverito, the head of the City Council. From there the picture got blurry. Did they send the letters? Or did they not? I’ll need to get more information on that. This is Channel 1 News, with Ella Lille Yerington and that is our top story today. Thank You.”

“By that time one of the council members had come out to talk to us about what we were doing. He asked “What are your favorite foods that you got/get from food vendors?” Of course we shouted “Gyro, hot dog, Dosa!” Then we got to hand out handouts to people who happened to be passing by and got very interested in what we were doing. At that time we had started walking over to City Hall. Once we had crossed the street to City Hall, it started raining. When we were getting across the street we noticed some old grannies. We realized that they were trying to reinforce a no guns in schools rule.

We also met some “super heros” that were also getting interested in what we were doing. We say Bob, Captain America, Hulk, Spider-man and Minnie Mouse who were holding signs like us. Then someone opened the gate so we could get into City Hall. Once we got in we saw someone had come out of City Hall to see us. He said that we could not enter the grounds but we said we just wanted to deliver letters to the speaker. So he took the letters and gave us his card.”

“Who knows what will happen next, will they lift the cap or leave it?”

For many more pictures, check here.

City Hall Protest from LREI on Vimeo.