A months-long legal struggle to expand the opportunities for food trucks to operate in New Orleans ended in apparently complete victory Thursday when the City Council gave 6-0 approval to an ordinance authorizing 100 such trucks -- many times the current number -- and greatly expanding the areas where they can sell their food. Councilwoman LaToya Cantrell was absent. The...
A months-long legal struggle to expand the opportunities for food trucks to operate in New Orleans ended in apparently complete victory Thursday when the City Council gave 6-0 approval to an ordinance authorizing 100 such trucks -- many times the current number -- and greatly expanding the areas where they can sell their food. Councilwoman LaToya Cantrell was absent.
The ordinance, proposed and backed by the Landrieu administration, contains no provision for a "buffer zone" banning food trucks in a specified radius around brick-and-mortar restaurants. Whether to impose such a restriction, as the Louisiana Restaurant Association has urged, became the most controversial aspect of a broader debate that has been going on since last fall.
Thursday's vote was the second time this year the council has passed an ordinance liberalizing the rules for food trucks. On April 18 it passed an ordinance sponsored by Councilwoman Stacy Head that authorized more trucks and loosened previous restrictions on them. However, Mayor Mitch Landrieu vetoed the law, citing comments by Head herself that she considered the 200-foot buffer zone in the April 18 ordinance unconstitutional. Head said she had accepted that restriction and several others to help win passage of her ordinance.
Saying she doubted she could muster the five votes necessary, Head did not try to override the mayor's veto. Instead, a few weeks later the administration presented its own ordinance, which went further than Head's compromise measure in opening the city's streets to food trucks. That was the ordinance the council passed Thursday, with a few amendments.
Council President Jackie Clarkson tried once again to add a "proximity restriction," in this case prohibiting food trucks from doing business within 100 feet "of the ingress or egress of any operating building or structure." However, no other council member would second her proposed amendment.
By broadening the prohibition to all businesses and emphasizing the importance of keeping entrances and exits open, Clarkson hoped to counter claims that she was trying simply -- and, in the view of critics, illegally -- to aid some eating establishments at the expense of others. However, the change apparently cost her the support of at least one of her colleagues.
At a council committee meeting Wednesday, Councilwoman Susan Guidry, herself a lawyer, made clear that she agreed with Clarkson that the council could legally create a buffer zone around fixed-location restaurants, even though the city attorney's office disagreed. Guidry said the city has the right to impose restrictions designed to protect an industry she said is vital to New Orleans' economy and "culinary culture."
However, she said after Thursday's meeting that she thought Clarkson's proposal went too far. She said eliminating all areas within 100 feet of any business would make it hard to find any places where food trucks could operate.
Guidry also noted that even if the council passed a proximity restriction, the city attorney's office was unlikely to defend it against a possible legal challenge. In addition, Landrieu had indicated through an aide Wednesday that he would probably veto any law the council passed that mandated such a buffer zone.
The ordinance was amended to say that food trucks cannot operate "in any manner that impedes the ingress or egress of a building or structure during its operating hours" -- meaning that people in line for food trucks cannot block the doors of nearby buildings.
The ordinance authorizes 100 permits for food trucks alone. At present, 100 permits are authorized for all types of mobile food vendors, including fruit and vegetable sellers, seafood peddlers and others.
Food trucks, whether existing or new, will be able to operate in two ways. First, after buying a $400 annual permit, they will be allowed automatically to operate on the streets in most areas of the city zoned for commercial, industrial or mixed use. Second, owners will be able to buy franchises to operate at specifically designated sites and times on streets in other areas including the Central Business District, Faubourg Marigny, residential neighborhoods citywide and along specified business corridors such as Canal Boulevard, Maple Street, Oak Street, St. Bernard Avenue, Paris Avenue, Elysian Fields Avenue and Franklin Avenue.
The trucks will be able to operate at any one location for a maximum of four hours, unless a franchise agreement allows longer hours at a specific site.
The trucks will be prohibited in the French Quarter because the streets there are too narrow and congested to accommodate them, officials said.
The
amount of the franchise fees will be recommended by the Department of
Public Works, which must also certify that the proposed location would
not interfere with traffic. The fees
will be capped at $28,200 a year. The fees and franchise agreements must then be approved by the
council, which will be able to impose further restrictions.
The council will hold a public hearing on each proposed food-truck franchise, meaning that neighbors of the proposed site will be able to comment on whether they want a food truck near their home or business. All applicants for franchises will have to post signs announcing their plans in the same block where the truck would be parked.
Operators must have $500,000 in
liability insurance, must comply with all city and state health laws,
must be approved by the state Department of Health and Hospitals, must pay sales tax and must clean up all debris within a 50-foot radius
each day. They cannot sell alcohol. Their trucks cannot be more than
26 feet long or 8 feet wide. Loudspeakers and street or sidewalk furniture are prohibited.