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For years, a group of determined New Yorkers has quietly cashed in on a decades-old anti-idling law, collecting six-figure payouts by reporting trucks that leave their engines running. This lucrative practice traces back to a 1971 law that prohibits non-emergency vehicles from idling for more than three minutes, aiming to curb pollution and noise. Enforcing the law had proved to be a challenge for decades. That is, until, the vast majority of New York residents became armed with a smartphone capable of recording video. The city's Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) rolled out the Citizens Air Complaint Program in 2019, which allowed members of the public to send video evidence to the city of idling trucks. If a ticket is issued, the person who reported it is entitled to up to 25 percent of the ticket's value. The reward jumps up to 50 percent of the fine if the reporter pursues the case through Office of Administrative Trials and Hearings without the city issuing a summons. Patrick Schnell, a Brooklyn pediatrician, has made more than $580,000 doing this since 2019, according to records cited by the New York Post. Schnell disputed this figure, telling the Post that he received a lot less than that for his 'hard work.' The Daily Mail has approached Schnell for further comment. In March 2022, Schnell wrote a blog post explaining that he reports idling trucks because breathing in polluted air can lead to serious conditions such as asthma, lung cancer, pneumonia, ischemic heart disease and strokes. As of 2023, all five boroughs had higher concentrations of harmful particles in the air than what is considered safe by the World Health Organization. Ernest Welde — who lives in Manhattan, the most polluted borough — has earned a staggering $895,737 reporting idling trucks to the city, according to The Post. This equates to more than $100,000 per year, and that's on top of his full-time job as an environmental lawyer. Another top earner through the program is Michael Streeter, a Brooklyn Heights resident who has raked in $709,975 so far. 'Michael is awesome,' neighbor Nick Burkett-Caudell told the outlet. 'What Michael does is great for the neighborhood in Brooklyn. 'It does a lot for keeping the traffic moving, reducing congestion, and reducing the pollution that comes out of these trucks that are just idling for, who knows, 20 minutes, half an hour, when they could be shut off.' Burkett-Caudell added that he supports Streeter making six figures, since he says what he does benefits everyone in the neighborhood. Elsewhere, Lower East Side residents Wanfang Wu and Ephraim Rosenbaum are also among the top earners in this unusual field. They have made $748,825 and $725,025, respectively. In a segment on 'The Daily Show' last year, Streeter revealed that there are about 20 to 30 people religiously reporting idlers and making a living from it. The other anti-idlers told the comedy show that their overarching goal is to hold big corporations like Amazon and UPS to account for parking their vehicles on the street and leaving their engines running. Records obtained by The Post show that between 2019 and 2023, New York City's clean air warriors were targeting trucks with LabQ Clinical Diagnostics LLC the most frequently. These trucks used to litter the streets and served as mobile COVID-19 testing units. LabQ was hit with nearly 3,300 violations over those four years. At the time, these trucks needed to have their engines on in order to refrigerate test samples. Now, ConEdison has the most violations to date with 22,898. Verizon follows with 13,544 and Amazon is in third with 10,949. Critics of the citizen program say that the air pollution vigilantes don't realize that truck engines sometimes need to be on in order to power refrigeration systems, power systems, computers and liftgates. DEP Commissioner Rohit Aggarwala testified in 2024 that some people are also committing fraud by submitting the same video multiple times or fabricating reports outright. Queens City Councilman and Environmental Committee leader James Gennaro has emerged as one of the main detractors of the program. Gennaro introduced a bill last year that would cut the payouts in half for residents who report illegal idlers. It also gives the DEP commissioner the power to permanently disqualify people from the program who have tried to defraud it with false complaints.
