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Park Advocates Call For City To Fight Rampant Tourist Scalpers
By
Ben Yakas
Published May 31, 2015
Modified May 31, 2015
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By
Ben Yakas
Published May 31, 2015
Modified May 31, 2015
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This week, a con man was arrested after he allegedly charged a pair of tourists $200 each for tickets on the Staten Island Ferry. Parks advocates now say that scammers like 54-year-old suspect Gregory Reddick are running rampant in Battery Park ripping off tourists. "It's wild wild west down there," said parks advocate Geoffrey Croft. "They city needs to rein in these types of operations."
"The scalpers display no IDs," Croft continued. "They operate in broad daylight on parks property. Besides the Parks Department, where is the Department of Consumer Affairs? They're absent." Parks Enforcement Patrol officers have been assigned to the Bowling Green station to specifically combat some of these con artists.
The Statue Cruise's ticket-office manager said they get forty to fifty complaints a day. "They sell tickets that are overly inflated at best, and at worst, they’re fraudulent tickets. They’ll sell used tickets. They’ll even sell passage to this park right here for $50," Joe Puleo, president of the park officers union, told WPIX.
Reddick, who was arrested on Tuesday, allegedly sold two tickets to the Staten Island Ferry to two tourists from Virginia and charged them $409, despite the fact that the Ferry is free. Reddick, was wearing an "Authorized Ticket Agent" jacket, and is employed by SJQ Tours. The owner of the company, Corey Lashley, defended his company to WPIX: "Over 150 tickets we received from parks and police. Every last one was dismissed," Lashley said.
Croft says that even if SJQ is technically registered with the state, they're not treating customers properly: "The unscrupulous scammers sell Statue of Liberty tickets for between $ 80 - 100 dollars; re-sell used Statue of Liberty tickets; sell people tickets to the Staten Island Ferry and charge people $ 20 just to enter Battery Park, a public park on the tip of Manhattan," he wrote on his site.
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Ben Yakas
Ben Yakas is a former Gothamist reporter.
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