Representatives of the United Bodegas of America (UBA) will be granted a sit-down with NYPD Commissioner Dermot Shea and his top brass regarding a host of issues including recent robberies and assaults on bodega workers, as well as the dangers for shop workers enforcing the city’s mandated face mask rule.

The meeting is expected to take place on Wednesday, September 16 at Police Plaza in Lower Manhattan.

In a statement released on Tuesday, Sept. 15 announcing the sit-down, Radhames Rodriguez, the President of UBA, wrote, “It’s been an awful year for all of us in the bodega business. We are now forced to enforce a mask policy that’s going to get someone killed.”

In the same press release, bodega owner Carlos Herrera wrote, “These times remind me of the ’70s, ’80s and ’90s when we literally had to carry bats and hire personal security to close our business. Today, we are less secure and that needs to change.”

In the closing remarks of the press release, UBA spokesman Fernando Mateo added, “Commissioner Shea will hear our concerns, we will share videos never seen before of beatings, robberies and assaults that went unreported. Bottom line is – we want public safety to return to New York City.”

Members of the UBA stood shoulder to shoulder on Aug. 30 when, as reported by Norwood News, they announced a woman with a butcher knife had caused $70,000 in damage to the LizBeth Supermarket on Watson Avenue in the Soundview section of the Bronx after being told to wear a mask.

LizBeth owner, Wascar Soto, said the suspect, identified by police as Ariel Gager, 29, was arrested, released and was back on her Bruckner Boulevard stoop before the store was back to normal, a jab at the City’s recent ‘no bail’ policy.

Mateo will likely bring up similar problems of crime, assaults and the enforcement of masks among taxi drivers, as Mateo is also president of the New York State Federation of Taxi Drivers.

When contacted late Tuesday night, the NYPD had not responded to a request for comment.