Crescenzi v. City of N.Y., 18-1002
| Decision Date | 03 October 2019 |
| Docket Number | No. 18-1002,August Term 2018,18-1002 |
| Citation | 939 F.3d 511 |
| Parties | Armando CRESCENZI, James Kennedy, Albert Simmons, Howard Dalton, Oral Fields, Plaintiffs-Appellees, v. The CITY OF NEW YORK, Veronica M. White, Chairman of the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, Individually and in Her Official Capacity, Bruce Langston, Asha Harris, John Does # 1-10, Defendants-Appellants, Raymond Kelly, Individually and in His Official Capacity, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Second Circuit |
For Plaintiffs-Appellees: Joshua P. Fitch, Cohen & Fitch LLP, New York, NY.
For Defendants-Appellants: Devin Slack (Richard Dearing, on the brief), for Zachary W. Carter, Corporation Counsel of the City of New York, New York, NY.
Before: Katzmann, Chief Judge, and Livingston and Droney, Circuit Judges.
Defendant-Appellant the City of New York ("the City") appeals from a March 29, 2018 judgment of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (Daniels, J .), granting judgment to Plaintiffs-Appellees on their 42 U.S.C. § 1983 false-arrest claim. On appeal, the City argues that the district court erred in determining that New York General Business Law ("GBL") § 35-a(7)(i) does not require curbside vending. We agree and conclude that § 35-a(7)(i) does require curbside vending. Accordingly, we reverse the judgment of the district court.
The City is a bustling metropolis in which walking is the primary means of getting around for many of the 8.5 million people who call the City home (not to mention the City’s 60 million annual visitors). See Winnie Hu, New York’s Sidewalks Are So Packed, Pedestrians Are Taking to the Streets , N.Y. Times, June 30, 2016, http://nyti.ms/2je0h4J. Much of this pedestrian traffic takes place on sidewalks. Congestion and blockages on these busy sidewalks, then, can create frustrating challenges and real dangers for people simply trying to get to work, school, or the grocery store. The City, cognizant of the sometimes-difficult circumstances of its pedestrians, regulates its sidewalks with a complex patchwork of laws and regulations in order to ensure a steady—and safe—flow of foot traffic. See, e.g. , N.Y. City Admin. Code § 19-125(d) (); id. § 19-128.1(b)(5) (newsracks); N.Y. City Zoning Resolution §§ 26-23, 26-42 (); 34 R.C.N.Y. § 2-20(q)(4) (street poles).
Armando Crescenzi, James Kennedy, Albert Simmons, Howard Dalton, and Oral Fields (collectively, "Plaintiffs-Appellees") are five disabled veterans who were issued, as relevant here, 298 summonses between 2011 and 2013 while vending in front of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The summonses were issued by City Parks Enforcement Patrol ("PEP") officers for Plaintiffs-Appellees’ failure to comply with orders to relocate their vending carts in violation of the City’s rule that no person shall "refuse to comply with the lawful direction or command" of any PEP officer. See 56 R.C.N.Y. § 1-03(c)(1). The stated "lawful" basis for the relocation orders was that Plaintiffs-Appellees were contravening § 35-a(7)(i) by operating their carts more than three feet from the curb. Each summons contained nearly identical language. To take one example:
I did observe the respondent vending food from a cart on parks property that is under the jurisdiction of NYC Parks. The respondent cart was approximately 20 feet from the curb. I told the food vendor that according to GBL 35-a(7)(i) a vendor must occupy no more than three (3) linear feet measured from the curb. When asked to move to the curb the respondent failed to comply with my directives.
A-654.
On February 5, 2013, Plaintiffs-Appellees filed the instant action against the City under 42 U.S.C. § 1983 in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York.1 The complaint alleged a claim of false arrest, on the theory that Plaintiffs-Appellees were in compliance with § 35-a(7)(i) —if properly interpreted—at the time of the officers’ relocation orders, so that there was no probable cause to issue the summonses.2 The complaint also alleged a claim of selective enforcement.
After several years of discovery, the City moved for judgment on the pleadings. In a July 26, 2017 Memorandum Decision and Order on that motion, the district court dismissed the selective-enforcement claim3 but ruled for Plaintiffs-Appellees on the false arrest claim, as to which the district court deemed the "central question" to be "whether Section 35-a(7)(i) restricts a ... cart’s distance from the curb, or whether it simply restricts the size and dimensions of the cart." A-940. The court ultimately determined that § 35-a(7)(i) restricts only the size and dimensions of vending carts, reasoning primarily that because the provision’s first clause restricts only "the length of a cart and not its placement," it is therefore "logical that the next clause ... should be interpreted in the same manner—that is, restricting only a cart’s width between the curb and the property line and not its distance from the curb." A-941. Based on this interpretation, the court concluded that Plaintiffs-Appellees had "plausibly alleged that the officers who issued [the] summonses lacked probable cause to believe a violation" of § 35-a(7)(i) had occurred. A-944. After dealing with other issues in the litigation, the court entered judgment for Plaintiffs-Appellees on March 29, 2018, stating that there was "no probable cause to issue the Disputed Summonses." SPA-5.
The City timely appealed.
The district court’s probable cause determination turned on its antecedent resolution of the question whether § 35-a(7)(i) imposes a curbside vending requirement on disabled veteran vendors. Resolution of this municipal law question is sufficient to resolve this appeal. The district court determined that § 35-a(7)(i) merely imposes length and width restrictions on carts, which led it to conclude that there was no probable cause for the summonses. Plaintiffs-Appellees defend that interpretation before this Court. We review de novo both the district court’s probable cause determination under the Fourth Amendment, see United States v. Pabon , 871 F.3d 164, 173 (2d Cir. 2017) (citing Ornelas v. United States , 517 U.S. 690, 699, 116 S.Ct. 1657, 134 L.Ed.2d 911 (1996) ), and its determination as to the meaning of § 35-a(7)(i). We conclude that § 35-a(7)(i) prohibits vending more than three feet from the sidewalk curb—in other words, that it imposes a curbside vending requirement.4 Accordingly, the officers did not lack a basis to issue the summonses, and the district court’s conclusion to the contrary is reversed.
Section 35-a(7)(i) has two clauses. The first clause provides that no vendor "shall occupy more than eight linear feet of public space parallel to the curb." The second clause provides that no vendor "shall occupy more than three linear feet to be measured from the curb toward the property line." The language of the second clause is somewhat unusual, and we recognize some ambiguity in the interpretive task it presents us. Nevertheless, we conclude that, on balance, the City’s interpretation makes better sense of that clause. According to the City, § 35-a(7)(i) does two things simultaneously: first, it limits the dimensions of vending carts to eight feet in length by three feet in width; second, it requires that carts be positioned lengthwise alongside the curb , out of the way of pedestrians. This interpretation gives full effect to every word in the second clause. Carts can occupy the three feet nearest the curb, "to be measured from the curb toward the property line."
By contrast, Plaintiffs-Appellees’ interpretation ignores the distinct and unusual phrasing of the second clause. In their view, this clause simply requires that carts be no more than three feet in width. But they never explain how that interpretation accords with § 35-a(7)(i) ’s language. If all the legislature had wanted to do was limit the dimensions of vending carts, it could have written a straightforward provision reading "no vendor’s operation shall occupy more than eight feet in length by three feet in width." Tellingly, however, that’s not what the legislature did. Instead, it wrote a provision with the clause that no vendor "shall occupy more than three linear feet to be measured from the curb toward the property line." Plaintiffs-Appellees offer no rationale for why the legislature would use such convoluted language if...
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...as meant to limit interference with pedestrian movement, and that that goal is a legitimate one. Crescenzi v. City of New York, 939 F.3d 511 (2d Cir. (300.) See also Brown v. Louisiana, 383 U.S. 131, 157 (1966) (arguing that unlike a public building, the public street is inevitably the locu......