Did the churro seller detained last week have a permit?
On Friday, several police officers surrounded Elsa Morochoduchi, a 43-year-old immigrant from Ecuador who was selling churros in a subway station, which is not permitted by the M.T.A. They handcuffed her, confiscated her cart and ultimately gave her a summons.
Mr. Attia said that he had later met with Ms. Morochoduchi and that she did not have a vending license or a permit for her churro cart. If she had both documents, she would have been able to sell on the street, but not in the station.
Is she typical of women selling food on the street?
Yes. In October, the Urban Justice Center published what it believes is the first survey of female street vendors in New York. Of the 50 women surveyed, 36 were from Mexico or Ecuador, like Elsa. Their average age was 46, and most were the primary breadwinners in their families.
The vendors typically lived in Queens, Brooklyn or the Bronx, and 72 percent of them did not have vending permits. The women said the work could be dangerous, but some said they still preferred it over domestic or restaurant work, their other main employment options.
What percentage of vendors are women?
The issue is lightly researched, so it is impossible to know. On the lucrative, tourist-rich corners of Manhattan, mobile food vendors tend to be men. But in some immigrant neighborhoods, the majority of the sellers are women.
In Corona, Queens, for example, a Street Vendor Project survey in 2017 found that 79 percent of the vendors were women. The organization also found that women seem to be disproportionately penalized for street vending.
In 2018, 57 percent of the tickets for unlicensed mobile food vending were issued to women, according to data from the city’s Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings. At the same time, only 22 percent of the 46,000 people who received mobile food vending licenses from 2000 to 2018 were female, the Street Vendor Project found.
Emma G. Fitzsimmons and Azi Paybarah contributed reporting.
