A new ordinance approved Tuesday by the Sacramento City Council’s Law and Legislation Committee could soon make it easier for food trucks to operate within city limits.
Under the proposed rule change, food trucks would be allowed to park along city streets beyond the current 30-minute limit. The permitting process would also be streamlined to allow more trucks to sell food on private property. Still, the trucks would have to remain 50 feet away from intersections and restaurant seating areas and would have to maintain a 1,000 foot distance from businesses with entertainment permits between 1 and 3 a.m.
The new regulations are important because of the ways in which the industry has changed, said Joy Patterson, a principal planner with the city.
“The way it all started, they’d go to places like construction sites, they’d go in and honk their horns and people would get all the food they wanted and then they’d go on to the next one,” she said. “But now things have changed – food trucks have changed.”
Representatives for both the restaurant and food truck industries have qualms about the new regulations. Javier Gonzalez, senior legislative director for the California Restaurant Association, says the rules aren’t strong enough. Paul Somerhausen, who heads the food truck organization SactoMoFo, admits it’s a start, but complains that the 1,000 radius around businesses with entertainment permits is just too onerous.
The proposed ordinance will now go before the city council for approval.
Read more about the proposed ordinance here here.