NEW YORK Teens, officials join to fight underage tobacco sales

Inspectors accompany the teens as they try to buy cigarettes.
NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
NEW YORK -- A clean-cut teenager sidled up to the deli counter, slid a crisp $10 bill to the cashier and asked for a pack of cigarettes.
"ID?" asked the clerk, giving the teen a skeptical glance. "No ID, no cigarettes."
As the youngster left the store empty-handed, two inspectors with the Department of Consumer Affairs -- who had been browsing nearby -- pulled out their badges and congratulated the vendor on upholding the law.
Meanwhile, the teen -- a 15-year-old undercover operative named Jeff -- waited outside and prepared to do it again.
"Sometimes you feel bad for getting [vendors] in trouble," said Jeff, whose full name is being withheld for his protection. "But my philosophy is ... you didn't ask for ID, so shame on you."
Enforcement program
Eighty teens from all over New York City are teaming up with city inspectors to stamp out illegal sales of cigarettes to minors through the Tobacco Youth Enforcement Program. The New York state-sponsored program, which started in 1998, has been credited with boosting the citywide compliance rate on preventing tobacco sales to minors to 82 percent from 54.
Since October, teams have made close to 5,000 inspections, with 851 vendors caught, Consumer Affairs officials said.
Jeff -- who works about 30 hours a week -- has initiated eight busts in a scant month on the job.
"The first pharmacy I went into -- it was a CVS -- they didn't ask me for ID. It was a shock," he said. "It's more the people you'd think that would ask you for an ID that don't, and the people that you wouldn't think would ask you for ID that do."
The program is open to youths from 15 to 17 years old; the pay is $7.25 an hour (plus fare for the subway). They can work after school and on weekends during the school year and full-time during the summer.
Every effort is taken to ensure the teens' safety -- which is why individuals do not work in their own neighborhoods, any areas where they feel uncomfortable or anywhere they might know people in the establishment. And they are always accompanied by at least two Consumer Affairs inspectors.