Midday News: MTA Worker Killed in Midtown, Hoboken PATH Station Closing for Renovation, and Roosevelt Avenue Prostitution Crackdown Extended

Reporter: Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Monday, January 27th. Here's the midday news from David Furst.

David Furst: The NYPD says a 39-year-old worker has died after an MTA bus driver hit a boom lift he was on in Midtown Manhattan last night. Police say the bus was heading south on Fifth Avenue around 9:30 when it hit the base of the lift which was protruding into the road at East 51st Street. According to officials, 39-year-old Vladimir Cruz of the Bronx fell off and suffered severe trauma. He was taken to a nearby hospital where he was pronounced dead. The NYPD says the driver stopped at the scene. Police are investigating. There have been no arrests. The MTA says no passengers were injured in the incident. The Hoboken PATH train station will close for nearly a month starting this week. The Port Authority says the closure starts just before midnight on Thursday and will last until early morning on February 24th as part of a $430 million plan to modernize the 116-year-old system. Crews will tack switch and staircase repairs all at once to minimize the disruption.

The agency is rolling out free shuttle buses, extra ferry service, and additional trains to help ease the impact. This comes just weeks after PATH fares increased to $3 per ride and as many commuters look to avoid Manhattan's $9 congestion pricing. In a previous version of the story, we misstated when the closure would begin. 35 degrees right now. Sunny today with a high near 40. This is WNYC.

Reporter: Stay close. There's more after the break.

Tiffany Hanssen: Here on WNYC, I'm Tiffany Hanssen. Roosevelt Avenue in Queens has been the center of attention for open-air prostitution. In October, the Adams administration launched a major enforcement action called Operation Restore Roosevelt. It was meant to last for 90 days, but last week city officials said the enforcement operation will continue in indefinitely. Arun Venugopal is a senior reporter in the WNYC Race and Justice Unit and he has been following the issue closely. He joins us now. Hi Arun.

Arun Venugopal: Hi, Tiffany.

Tiffany Hanssen: All right. Well, let's start with city officials. What are they saying about the operation so far and why they've decided to continue on with it?

Arun Venugopal: Well, they point to nearly 1,000 arrests in the three months of this operation so far. That includes 134 arrests related to prostitution. They also say they've handed out 11,500 summonses. They've inspected nearly 300 buildings and ended with 18 vacate orders. They shut down a number of these operations, which include illegal massage parlors.

They have all these results. They point to a lot of community support as well. Kaz Daughtry is the deputy commissioner of the NYPD and he had this to say at a town hall I attended in Corona on Wednesday night.

Kaz Daughtry: Nobody should be outside on Roosevelt Avenue in 9-degree weather soliciting Johns for sex. That's not something that we're going to allow. We are totally committed to staying past the 90 days. We're working out another plan and what phase two is going to look like at Roosevelt Avenue. We're going to make it a lot better than what it is now

Arun Venugopal: Daughtry said overall crime in the Roosevelt Avenue Corridor is down 21% in the year to date. They have real results they're pointing to.

Tiffany Hanssen: I assume it's all of these results you're talking about here that the city points to in terms of the reasoning behind why they've decided to continue.

Arun Venugopal: I think it certainly helps. This area, it's not just something that has drawn attention in Queens or even in the city for that matter. There are YouTube videos where people watch this as internationally, sort of the spectacle of sex work and open-air prostitution in this neighborhood. It got a lot of notoriety. Now these officials say, "Look, we've really made a difference here and it's worth staying the course."

Tiffany Hanssen: Well, what are community members telling you about this announcement? How are they responding?

Arun Venugopal: Some people are really happy about where things have gone. There are members of the community who had become afraid, said they were urging the city to take action. One of these people is Massiel Lugo. She's a teacher at public school, also a single mother of two kids. She said she was scared to take her seven-year-old son, who's autistic, on walks in the neighborhood and that her 15-year-old daughter was getting catcalled constantly by drunken men who she says, were drawn to the presence of prostitutes in the area around Roosevelt and 90th street. Since the operation began though she said there's been a complete turnaround.

Maassiel Lugo: Right now everything is great. Honestly, I have zero complaints. The neighborhood actually has been really quiet. I hardly see anyone now. It's clean, I'm able to walk to the grocery store with no issues. It's a huge difference.

Tiffany Hanssen: Well, Arun, that doesn't mean that there aren't people who aren't highly critical of this enforcement. You spoke to some, so what are they saying?

Arun Venugopal: Well, There are advocacy groups who say this is disproportionately hurting immigrants. This area is overwhelmingly populated by different immigrant groups. It's like a beacon for people who come from other countries and land in New York City. People are saying that this is really going to hurt them the most. Carina Kaufman Gutierrez is the deputy director of the Street Vendor Project. She says the crackdown on unlicensed vendors has really hurt immigrant workers who are just trying to earn a living.

Carina Kaufman Gutierrez: It has been devastating. It has been devastating financially, mentally, emotionally. We are seeing families at risk of eviction.

Arun Venugopal: There are also sex workers who say they're getting profiled. One of them told me she's been arrested three times, even when she's not engaged in sex work. She says she's also trans and she thinks that's part of the reason. I have reached out to the NYPD about this and still waiting to hear back.

Tiffany Hanssen: Well, it is complicated for some people. Arun, you followed up with a restaurant owner who initially complained about the problem of prostitution. Has since the enforcement seen some results. She now has mixed feelings about the police enforcement. Talk us through why that is.

Arun Venugopal: Oh, the restaurant owner is Tsomo Dasel. She owns Himalayan Yak on Roosevelt. She called 311 repeatedly to complain about this massage parlor that's on her block. When I walked by the business the other day, the Department of Buildings had stuck a do not enter sign at the entrance, shut down. Dasel says she's really glad about that but then President Trump was inaugurated and she says she's concerned that innocent people are going to be targeted, namely immigrants. Now she's not sure she wants the police around anymore.

Tiffany Hanssen: Arun Venugopal is a senior reporter in WNYC's Race and Justice Unit. Arun, thanks.

Arun Venugopal: Thanks, Tiffany.

Tiffany Hanssen: You can read all of Arun's reporting on Roosevelt Avenue in Queens right now at our news site, Gothamist.

Reporter: Thanks for listening. This is NYC Now from WNYC. Catch us every weekday, three times a day for your top news headlines and occasional deep dives. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. More soon

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