Damaging a fire hydrant will cost you

During the past five years, City Comptroller William Thompson’s office has stepped up its efforts to pursue individuals who damage city property to the tune of collecting more than $5 million in affirmative claims.
Collecting on damages to city fire hydrants, trees, street signs and light posts, Thompson’s office is telling residents that if they damage city property, get ready to pay the consequences.
In Queens, one of the prime targets for damage has been fire hydrants, with Thompson’s office collecting 18 claims for more than $43,000 since the 2003 fiscal year. During the 2006 and 2007 fiscal years, Thompson’s office collected 11 claims on damage to fire hydrants in the borough, and during the last five years, Queens leads all of the boroughs in number of claims recovered for damage to hydrants.
“We want to send a message that if you damage a hydrant, your wallet should suffer some damage as well,” Thompson said. “Anyone who destroys or damages city property needs to realize that it has value, and costs money to repair.”
Oftentimes, the city’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), which is in charge of repairing missing or broken hydrants, and insurance companies bring the claims to the attention of Thompson’s office who will then pursue the claims.
Meanwhile, Queens led the city in broken or missing fire hydrants for the 2007 fiscal year with 363 of 1,246 citywide, according to statistics from the DEP. However, those numbers are down from the 2006 fiscal year, which saw 420 reports of broken or missing hydrants in Queens and 1,669 citywide.
DEP spokesperson Mercedes Padilla said that the agency often receives reports from the Fire Department of New York (FDNY), who is in charge of inspecting the fire hydrants, or a citizen who notices the damaged hydrant, and it will send out a crew to repair the hydrant. Padilla said that the agency’s goal is to have less than 1 percent of hydrants out of service throughout the city at a given time.