A Queens councilwoman wants the city’s Sheriff’s Office to start cracking down on rogue boat owners who abandon their vessels in Big Apple waterways — the same way it goes after parking scofflaws.
Legislation recently introduced by Councilwoman Joann Ariola is being reworked to include a new system of fines and penalties for owners of abandoned boats, she told The Post Friday.
Enforcement would fall to the city’s deputy sheriffs, while the Parks Department would become officially responsible for removing abandoned boats, a duty it already carries out.
Unlike abandoned cars, New York lacks a formal system with enforcement rules for removing and disposing abandoned boats.
Hundreds of the vessels – including many left behind nearly a decade ago during Hurricane Sandy – are currently polluting the city’s 520 miles of shorelines, according to officials.
Ariola’s bill would also require the Department of Small Business Services to create and maintain a log of abandoned boats and their locations.
The Parks Department says it’s contracted out the removal of more than 300 vessels and 5,000-plus cubic yards of debris from waterways over the last six years.
Last month, Ariola (R-Queens) and Councilwoman Selvena Brooks-Powers (D-Queens) introduced another bill requiring the mayor create an “Office of Marine Debris Disposal and Vessel Surrendering” with its own director and staff dedicated to helping keep the city’s shorelines clean. Both bills will be the subject of a June 13 hearing before the Council’s Committee of Resiliency and Waterfronts.
Ariola said her new bill, when updated, would also set up a recycling program for abandoned boats. She also wants to add in language requiring some of the recovered boats to be used as teaching tools for school kids to learn how they’ve led to fuel and all sorts of debris polluting the waters.
The Mayor’s Office says it will review the new legislation.