By New York City Mayor Eric Adams and UBA President Radhames Rodriguez

Bodegas are on every corner of New York City, there for us at all hours, and the bodegueros who service them become our family. So, when the COVID-19 pandemic hit our city, our bodegas were a lifeline to our local communities. We relied on them for toilet paper, snacks, diapers, and a sense of community at a time of extreme uncertainty.

And while New York City has seen declines in major crimes, it’s important that we take additional steps to address the crimes our bodegueros continue to face and give them a way contact 911 during an emergency without having to find their phone or fear being attacked by a criminal. Now, thanks to the partnership of the Adams administration and the United Bodegas of America, our bodegueros will be able to click a button during emergencies and NYPD will be on their way without anyone knowing.

New York City will be investing $1.6 million to fund “SilentShields” buttons at 500 bodegas that will instantly call the NYPD during emergencies. These buttons will immediately direct city resources to these small businesses so that New York City can be a lifeline for them, just like bodegas were a lifeline for us during COVID.

We are starting by distributing these buttons to bodegas in the areas with the highest levels of crime so that workers and customers, in communities who need them the most, will be safe and, more importantly, feel safe.

Now, workers will have more peace of mind if an armed criminal comes into a bodega to ransack their products or steal their cash and we will ensure that our small business owners can continue to make a living and stay open for the neighborhood.

And that’s not all: last year, we announced a program that lets local businesses voluntarily share surveillance video in real-time with the NYPD through their closed-circuit television cameras as they seek to solve crimes.

By allowing bodegas to integrate their security cameras with their local NYPD precinct, we can gather real-time intelligence on crimes and swiftly apprehend individuals who are responsible, while making NYPD more efficient and involving the local community in improving quality of life.

Adding to all this, thanks to the city expanding eligibility requirements for new officers and continued city funding, the Adams administration is on path to reaching 35,000 uniformed NYPD officers by the fall of 2026. That means that we will have more police officers available to respond to calls coming from bodegas, too.

To our bodegueros: New York City has your back.

Unidos somos más.