Editorial: Fairness, safety key for San Rafael food vendors

In recent years, San Rafael City Hall has tried to get a firmer handle on the proliferation of street food vendors, those curbside cooks who set up carts and peddle their gastronomical offerings.

The state Legislature in 2022 passed a law legalizing street vendors. The city has been trying to regulate where they can do business and to make sure they comply with health and safety codes.

In November, the city passed new regulations limiting vendors to operate in commercial and industrial areas without interfering with safe access to bus stops and business entrances and along sidewalks. They also require them to comply with local permitting and sales tax requirements.

Enforcement, in response to complaints, led to officials last year issuing more than 40 citations and 15 warnings. County environmental health officers confiscated food from 11 vendors.

Still, the numbers grow, mostly in the Canal neighborhood.

State law limits enforcement to citations and fines, which have not proven to be an effective deterrent, according to city staff.

Officials add that the vendors are mobile and frequently change locations, making it difficult for them to comply with the city’s standards for where they can and can’t set up their carts.

Now the city is looking for a location for a so-called “food park,” where vendors can set up their carts and operate in compliance with safety and health rules. The city is putting up $50,000 to pay a third-party contractor to establish and manage the park.

Underlying these efforts is the city seeking to balance these state-encouraged curbside entrepreneurs and a degree of fairness to brick-and-motor businesses and their requirement compliance with city permitting, licenses and health and safety codes.

Creating a food-vendors park should help address some of those concerns. At least, they will give vendors a city-sanctioned option.

The city plans have already been endorsed by the Canal Alliance, a longstanding neighborhood organization that serves and advocates for the local Latino immigrant population. It says the park would provide the vendors with visibility, safety and support.

“Thoughtfully designed vending zones or pilot marketplaces – in addition to the Canal Alliance’s seasonal marketplace events – will support vendors while improving pedestrian access, sidewalk safety and neighborhood cohesion,” said Diana Benitez, a community development planner at the nonprofit.

The food park’s success will largely depend on its affordability and lack of regulatory hassles. Those are the primary reasons why street vendors choose their carts over acquiring permanent locations.

It is also questionable whether the park will reduce the proliferation of street food vendors.

They go where they think they can sell their offerings. If they don’t get enough customers to cover their cost and time, they’ll go somewhere else.

And as city officials stress, they have no problem staying mobile, moving around to find customers while at the same time staying a step ahead of any enforcement.

The city is also trying to balance local complaints and questions about health and safety issues with the state’s 2022 law that seeks to decriminalize street food vendors.

Long Beach Democrat state Sen. Lena A. Gonzalez authored Senate Bill 972 to establish a legal framework for sidewalk vending – or in bureaucratic lingo, “compact mobile food operations” and removing hurdles of “outdated and exclusionary regulations.”

The bill sailed through the Legislature and was signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Gonzalez stressed sidewalk food vending provides “vital economic opportunities for low-income and immigrant workers” – for many, a “first rung on an economic ladder.”

There are gaps and questions regarding possible local enforcement.

San Rafael is trying to navigate those gaps, while placing a priority on health and safety concerns.

Creating a food park is one of its strategies. The Canal Alliance’s backing is a strong sign that it possibly is a promising solution.