Customers visit The Whole Hog food truck last summer in downtown Buffalo. (Charles Lewis/Buffalo News)
A revised set of proposed rules for food trucks in the City of Buffalo has been unveiled with no change to the proposed $1,000 annual license fee.
Council President Richard A. Fontana, Niagara Council Member David A. Rivera and South Council Member Michael P. Kearns each said this week they'd like to see a lower proposed fee.
However, North Council Member Joseph Golombek Jr., the bill sponsor, said even though those three lawmakers have talked to him about it, he believes the proposal of $1,000 is fair.
"If you can afford $80,000 for a truck, I don't think a $1,000 fee is too excessive," Golombek said today.
Rivera said he initially took the position of having a lower fee because he wanted the city's fee to be more in line with the fees in other cities roughly the size of Buffalo, but there have been compromises as the law has developed and he will not push for a lower fee.
"If food trucks are willing to live with it, that's fine," Rivera said today.
When asked today whether the group was willing to accept the size of the fee, Mitchell M. Stenger, attorney for the Western New York Food Truck Association, said he was in the midst of canvassing his members.
As The Buffalo News reported last week, changes were already planned to the draft regulations. The amendments that have been proposed -- all of which were suggested by a group of food truck owners -- are:
--Distance: Food trucks must stay at least 100 feet from "the nearest edge of any building or section of a building comprising a licensed food establishment, excluding any patio, awning or temporary enclosure attached thereto..." where there is an open kitchen.
The previous version of the proposed rules called for a 100-foot buffer between a food truck and the property line of a restaurant with an open kitchen.
--Garbage cans: Removing a requirement for two, 65-gallon garbage cans and replacing it with the mandate that food trucks "must be equipped with trash receptacles of a sufficient capacity that shall be changed as necessary to prevent overflow or the creation of litter or debris."
--Hearing: Any food truck cited for its third violation would still be subject to an order to close immediately. However, the newest version of the proposed rules would allow the food truck to remain in operation until a hearing is held and a determination is made by the city.
Police or the Department of Permits and Inspections would still be able to force a a food truck to stop operating at a location if a blatant violation if found and its the third offense, but it wouldn't be an indefinite closure subject to a hearing, Golombek said.
Under the law, a hearing would be required within 60 days.
Golombek said he would have preferred a smaller time frame for the hearing, but he has been told by City License Director Patrick Sole Jr. that a hearing could not be guaranteed within the a shorter window if less than 60 days was required.
The previous version of the rules did not allow the food truck to remain in operation once it was shut down and a hearing was needed.
Golombek said that while the existing food truck operators generally have been "pretty good" at following the rules, he wants rules in place in case the next round of operators aren't as complaint.
"I'm concerned about he next level of food trucks," Golombek said. "...I want to make sure that they're as good as these guys are now."
Read the new rules here. And here are some video clips of the debate on food trucks in Common Council Chambers last week.
--Aaron Besecker
Follow me on Twitter: @BeseckerBN
tagged
City of Buffalo | Common Council | David Rivera | food trucks | Joseph Golombek
