It has long been a maxim that you can get anything you want in New York City, but a current dispute between produce vendors and the city is threatening to upset the fruit "cart" in Hunts Point in the South Bronx, according to an article about the "food fight" yesterday by Lisa Fickenscher at crainsnewyork.com
The 112-acre "market" is 43 years old and in serious need of repair and/or modernization and its lease with vendors there expires in 10 months.
"Surrounded by a 10-foot metal fence topped with barbed wire, the 112-acre property - with its squat, 1960s-era buildings - looks more like a prison than a bustling $2 billion center of commerce that supplies 60% of the city's fruit and vegetable needs. The facility, the biggest such market in the world, is so run-down that when it rains, drivers cannot avoid stepping down from their trucks into ankle-deep water because the uneven ground by the loading docks is full of puddles," according to the article.
In June, the Business Integrity Commission that regulates the city's six wholesale food markets proposed "a huge increase in the fee to register at the markets, to $4,000 from $250, and raised the price of BIC-issued employee ID cards to $100 a pop, the article said.
"Using every bit of leverage they have - including the fact that they provide 4,000 union jobs in one of the most economically deprived neighborhoods in the city - the produce merchants are playing hardball, threatening to move if BIC is not reined in. In July, they hired real estate advisory firm Jones Lang LaSalle to help them explore their options, including relocating to New Jersey when their current lease expires in 10 months," the article said.
Negotiations are now beginning between the Economic Development Corporation and the venders, and are "sure to address the BIC conflict," the article maintaining, noting that "both sides agreed to a $320 million design plan to build a modern market. The question now is the amount of the merchants' new rent; that will depend on how much money the city kicks in for the project and what it gets from state and federal government. A spokesman for Mayor Michael Bloomberg confirms that the city will contribute, though the amount has not been determined. The EDC declined to comment on the negotiations."
The market, the article continued, "outgrew its space years ago, and merchants resorted to using refrigerated truck trailers permanently parked on the grounds to store produce that won't fit inside the facility's four buildings."
To make matters worse, Philadelphia is nearly finished building a state-of-the-art produce market and is planning to woo Hunts Point customers from central New Jersey, if not from the city. Philadelphia merchants currently have some Big Apple clients.
"We have never had the competition that we have today," says Joel Fierman, co-owner of Fierman's Produce Exchange, a member of the Hunts Point cooperative.
To win back the cooperative's smaller customers and address the expected blitz from Philadelphia, Mr. Fierman, the article said, is spearheading its first marketing campaign.
"Vehicular congestion has also grown over the years," the article continued, "as trucks have gotten larger, choking out the smaller vans of other customers who want to get in to the market. Tired of battling the traffic and delays, bodega owners and mom-and-pop grocers, for example, have mostly stopped shopping there, going instead to the 32 produce businesses that have opportunistically cropped up outside the fortress fence. Smaller customers have also been siphoned off by big-box discount stores such as Sam's Club, Costco, BJ's Wholesale Club and Jetro, located in the same neighborhood."
The 112-acre "market" is 43 years old and in serious need of repair and/or modernization and its lease with vendors there expires in 10 months.
"Surrounded by a 10-foot metal fence topped with barbed wire, the 112-acre property - with its squat, 1960s-era buildings - looks more like a prison than a bustling $2 billion center of commerce that supplies 60% of the city's fruit and vegetable needs. The facility, the biggest such market in the world, is so run-down that when it rains, drivers cannot avoid stepping down from their trucks into ankle-deep water because the uneven ground by the loading docks is full of puddles," according to the article.
In June, the Business Integrity Commission that regulates the city's six wholesale food markets proposed "a huge increase in the fee to register at the markets, to $4,000 from $250, and raised the price of BIC-issued employee ID cards to $100 a pop, the article said.
"Using every bit of leverage they have - including the fact that they provide 4,000 union jobs in one of the most economically deprived neighborhoods in the city - the produce merchants are playing hardball, threatening to move if BIC is not reined in. In July, they hired real estate advisory firm Jones Lang LaSalle to help them explore their options, including relocating to New Jersey when their current lease expires in 10 months," the article said.
Negotiations are now beginning between the Economic Development Corporation and the venders, and are "sure to address the BIC conflict," the article maintaining, noting that "both sides agreed to a $320 million design plan to build a modern market. The question now is the amount of the merchants' new rent; that will depend on how much money the city kicks in for the project and what it gets from state and federal government. A spokesman for Mayor Michael Bloomberg confirms that the city will contribute, though the amount has not been determined. The EDC declined to comment on the negotiations."
The market, the article continued, "outgrew its space years ago, and merchants resorted to using refrigerated truck trailers permanently parked on the grounds to store produce that won't fit inside the facility's four buildings."
To make matters worse, Philadelphia is nearly finished building a state-of-the-art produce market and is planning to woo Hunts Point customers from central New Jersey, if not from the city. Philadelphia merchants currently have some Big Apple clients.
"We have never had the competition that we have today," says Joel Fierman, co-owner of Fierman's Produce Exchange, a member of the Hunts Point cooperative.
To win back the cooperative's smaller customers and address the expected blitz from Philadelphia, Mr. Fierman, the article said, is spearheading its first marketing campaign.
"Vehicular congestion has also grown over the years," the article continued, "as trucks have gotten larger, choking out the smaller vans of other customers who want to get in to the market. Tired of battling the traffic and delays, bodega owners and mom-and-pop grocers, for example, have mostly stopped shopping there, going instead to the 32 produce businesses that have opportunistically cropped up outside the fortress fence. Smaller customers have also been siphoned off by big-box discount stores such as Sam's Club, Costco, BJ's Wholesale Club and Jetro, located in the same neighborhood."
Architecture Critic
Carter Horsley
Since 1997, Carter B. Horsley has been the editorial director of CityRealty. He began his journalistic career at The New York Times in 1961 where he spent 26 years as a reporter specializing in real estate & architectural news. In 1987, he became the architecture critic and real estate editor of The New York Post.
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