The city is launching a new “enforcement squad” at La Guardia Airport to put a dent in the large number of illegal taxi hustlers preying on vulnerable tourists, The Post has learned.
The crackdown won’t come cheap: $1.2 million the first year and $1 million each succeeding year for 20 inspectors and the handheld devices they’ll need to issue summonses.
But officials say they expect business to be so brisk that taxpayers should recoup at least $1 million a year from fines and tow fees.
Meera Joshi, the city’s taxi chief, said there’s good reason to step up enforcement at La Guardia to match a previous effort at JFK.
“Our work at the airports is a very important part of what we do, protecting the public from vehicles that are under insured and not inspected to our high standards, and drivers that haven’t been drug- or background-tested,” Joshi said.
The program begun at JFK in October 2013 has resulted in 8,140 summonses for illicit taxis and the seizure of 3,107 unlawfully-operated vehicles.
Inspectors were so busy that a second squad was formed in January. So far, it has issued an additional 761 summonses and hauled off 314 more vehicles.
La Guardia has been patrolled only on days when inspectors were relocated from JFK. That limited enforcement yielded just 372 summonses, with 197 vehicles grabbed in all of 2014.
In addition to protecting tourists from unsafe drivers or jacked-up fees, the enforcement plan is designed to protect yellow-cab drivers from illegal competition.
Drivers often wait hours at airport parking lots before they’re dispatched to collect passengers — who line up at taxi stands outside the terminals.
Yet operators of unlicensed black cars can drive straight to the terminal exits and scoop up customers even before they reach the legitimate taxi-stand line.
“This is the most beefed-up enforcement that they’ve had, so we’re glad to see it,” said Bhairavi Desai, director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance.
“For [yellow] taxi drivers, airports are the most important source of income,” she added.
While most people welcome the crackdown, the Taxi & Limousine Commission has also been accused of being overzealous — at times seizing vehicles that belong to regular drivers. In one case last year, a Hasidic man’s car was seized because his passenger — a woman who was not his wife — was seated in the back seat, as per religious custom.
