Latin American Food Vendors May be Driven Out of Red Hook Park

Latin American food vendors at Red Hook Park say a new rule giving preference to youth football leagues is driving away their main customers, the adult soccer leagues, according to the Brooklyn Paper.

The article says that a Parks Department regulation that gives youth sports leagues preference for the field near Bay and Court streets is driving away the largely Latino adult soccer teams that have played for years at the space – as well as the taco and pupusa vendors that have made the park “a vibrant hub for Latino culture.”

“It’s an important part of our customer base,” Cesar Fuentes, executive director of the Food Vendors Committee of Red Hook Park, told the Paper.

Sharon Zukin, a sociologist who has written about Red Hook Park’s food carts, told the Paper that the vendors may begin to roll with the punches and “start selling more hamburgers than huaraches.”

The city has been cracking down on food carts and trucks this year, with a measure introduced in November to give carts letter grades, just like restaurants have.