Council - Special Meeting

Mr. Mayor, we're live. Thank you for that, David. All right, the time uh I'm calling to order the city council special meeting for March 4th, 2026. The time is 5:07 p.m. City Clerk, can we get roll call, please? Here. Here, here. Here. Here.

Thank you for that, city clerk. Right. I'm now going to open public communications. Seeing that there is no one in the audience today, I will now close public communication. Right. There is one open session study session and that is the um mobile food truck vendors. Manny, who's going to be presenting this? Thank you, Mr. Mayor. We have Okina, our community development director, as well as Carlos, the supervisor of the division, and they will give a joint collaboration. And Okina, it's all yours.

Yes. Thank you, sir. Thank you, uh, Mr. Mayor and member of the city council. Tonight before you you have uh a study session uh with regards to the discussion of mobile food truck vendors and this issue have been coming up quite a bit throughout the community. We have some uh mixed feelings and emotion as well, but we have codes in a book that requires the regulation and enforcement of such. And what's provided you tonight is uh a copy of the regulation that's spelled out in the Baldwin Park Municipal Code. And as well as we prepared a PowerPoint for yourself. We created this for you to be able to uh follow and then also um take some notes as needed as well. So uh next please David or Charles. This uh next slide is with regards to the time limit regarding vendors uh for food trucks and basically the time limit that's set forth is 10-minute interval with regards to a a single location. So, one of the concern is that one specific or two specific food truck has been parking uh within the city limit in front of a shopping center on the street for hours on end. And in addition to the time limit, there is a uh separation requirement with regards to um the distance separation of no less than 100 ft from each other. This is to prevent and mitigate any traffic congestion uh accessibility as well as uh over concentration of these uh type

of food facility throughout the community. Um along with this behind your attachment before I move to the next slide is a survey of all the surrounding cities that um Carlos and his team uh surveyed with regards to other agencies and their regulatory requirement and I'll go through that um after the presentation itself. Next slide please. So, so far as part of the collaboration of our business license division, uh I've asked our business license division to run the uh business license of all the different fire food trucks that is permitted, approved by the health department and licensed within the city of Baldwin Park. And there's a total of six that's currently licensed. I hear um through the mum uh rumor uh mill that there's only one that's licensed in the city. Uh one is permitted and in fact six of them are throughout the city itself. The aerial photo that is attached as part of this slide shows two specific um food truck vendor. the two specific location that is a stem of the complaints that comes before the city council under public comments and uh randomly throughout the community itself through our community enhancement officers uh division as well as complaints that does come in. So the aerial photo shows the the location of the two food truck right in front of the Target shopping center. And when looking at this uh shopping center and the area surrounding it, they have quite a bit of a variety of food use

from your typical Starbucks to raising canes to um other fast food type of business and mom and pops as well. So, but the food truck delivers something that's complimentary to the variety of food that people can use and uh and eat. So, the two trucks that is parked at this location is the um the Barbachi Grill and the uh the Cali Sweet Inc. So, they're the two type of food truck that's typically concentrated and located here throughout the days.

Okay. Now, will you elaborate a little bit more? You said six food trucks are approved. Can you elaborate on what approved means other than business license?

Yes. So any food trucks in order for them to be legal licensed legit, they have to go through they have to file and get um health department approval to make sure their facility is sanitized, meet all the health code and health requirement. And upon obtaining that approval, any city that they do business at, whether let's just say Okino's food truck and I Okino food truck throughout the day I travel through 10 cities. Well, if I do business within 10 cities, I get 10 business license. So as part of our city in terms of the licensing with the city of Baldwin Park, we have six food truck license that is licensed and approved by um the health department, the county health department and the city of Ballin Park through uh a city business license. And this is not the list of all the food trucks that comes through the city that are not licensed and not legal and not legit. So there's many variety of food trucks that travel through the city that is licensed and approved by the county health department but not licensed and approved by the city of Bal Park.

Another question, are we still issuing permits for food trucks or has that stopped? Yes. um they they can come in anytime, any day um when the business and city hall hours operation uh is open to apply for a city business license, pay for the permit, post it on their truck, and when whether it's law enforcement, city official, or community enhancement officer goes to the facility and asks them, "Are you licensed and permitted within the city?" they're able to show it via their vehicle registration and post it on their windows or their tags itself.

Quick question for the follow up on that. Okina, uh, is there a limit of licenses that we issue as a city or is it limited as long as they have their permits? As long as they have their permits, as long as the license, as long as they obey all rules and regulation, they have every right to um, operate within our city limits. And when you said they have to come I'm sorry. When you say you have to come into the city to apply for the permit, what hours are we giving them to be able to come to the counter? Because I know that I've had a lot of complaints about the counter hours. So what are the hours of operation that they're able to come to the to the counter? So we recently adjusted our hours operation from 7:30 till 5:30.

Oh, perfect. Okay. And the the last 30 minute is for our our intake division um that deal with with monies and checks and clearance and till closing out the till. So building and safety our business license taking money and writing receipts and so forth. They need that extra 30 minute to close out their till for the day. Uh deposit the check in the safe and get it secured before the next business day. Okay. So then if anyone asks, they're able to come to our counter any day from Monday to Thursday from 7:30 to 5:30. Yes. Perfect. Thank you.

Yes. And they also can communicate with us via 247 email, phone because we have voice messages that can take down information and we do follow-up phone calls. Perfect. Thank you, Councilman Bravo. Licenses. I would not walk saturate.

It's going to be very difficult. Um, uh, the city attorney will be able to share with you the legality of that. And because it's not just county regulated, it's also state regulated. So, we can't limit the number of folks coming in. We can regulate it in terms of the folks that comes in and do business in the city, whether they have a city business license or not. And we could implement some restrictions of where they could park and how close to another food truck, how close to a restaurant.

Yes, we could put quite a bit of stipulation restriction districts, streets, distance away from schools, parks, um you know, other other situation, distance separation between food truck. We do actually have that in our code currently. Um, you know, as an example, 100 ft away from another food truck. I know in this instance they're next to each other or close to each other, less than 100 ft for sure. Um, there's distance separation um that they have to keep away from schools. Now, um, our city is um pretty lax. Uh for example, specifically icing truck, they cannot uh obstruct the view that's 200 ft in both direction of the street. Basically, it prevents them from staying like right at a corner intersection where there's kids crossing the streets or what have you. So 200 feet distance separation. Um they have to be separated at at least 200 feet for audible noise because ice cream truck has you know music and announcement and volume and so forth. Some crank it really high some crank it um enough just appropriate. So we have those type of situation also on page two of your ordinance uh section O it stipulate the hours that they can be within our city from 9 our city is 9:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m. each day. So that's a restriction hours operation. I've seen from 7:00 a.m. to 1000 p.m. I've seen uh a lot less. when we get to the survey we can walk through that that step and process.

Any other question or should I go on to the next one? Okay. Uh next slide please. So the purpose the purpose of this is to allow food trucks within the time uh and and basically establish a time frame that the council see fit. Right now, in our current code, it's 10-minute interval. That means they can park there for 10 minutes, do their business, not realistic,

move on. It's it's absolutely not realistic. I think originally and initially it's intended to try to prohibit that activity from happening, but the reality of operation, you know, I I'll just use a taco taco truck as an example, right? I want to order, you know, five tacos. Well, it takes me 10 minutes to do two tacos. Does that mean you got to follow me a couple hundred feet away just for me to prepare the other two or the other three? It doesn't make sense realistically. The burger over for

Right. Exactly. So, we have to the big question for the council is that do we want this? Do we support mobile food truck, mobile businesses? And if we do, how flexible or how restrictive we want to regulate it? And you got to look at it from an operational standpoint and and what have you. And you know, the second bullet is allow food truck only to operate between the hours of whatever the of is right. So that's the purpose of this study uh study question uh the study session. Our goal is we have this discussion, we vet the issue, we come to consensus, provide direction to staff and staff will draft the ordinance, work with the city attorney what we can and cannot regulate, how long, how much, what's the distance or what have you within the purview that we're allowed to do based on state legislation, based on new laws. every as you're aware every year sometimes every so often months state changes regulation I don't know if you if the council know we have regulation on not just food trucks food vendors food carts food stand um home businesses micro businesses microenterprise business and many other things. So the county have been tasked to the county health department has been tasked to regulate all these facilities. Um and each facility each category has its own specification. To give you to give you example, for the

last few decades and this has been going on for at least a few decades already and the legislation is written with the intent to help mom and pop folks to earn some income to survive to put food on the table and in this case provide food to other folks. Right? So with the different type of food, the one thing that the health department have not yet allowed or approve is an individual coming in driving up to the curb, pull out their equipment, pull out their food, set up on the sidewalk, set up on a vacant lot, set up in a vacant parcel and start cooking and start preparing and selling food. The health department have not issued any license that I know of in the state of California to authorize that legality. Does it happen? Yes. Does it happen a lot? Yes. Does it get regulated quite a bit or enforced? Yes. And the reason for that is those type of facility requires from the health department what we what we typically refer to as the three compartment sink. You go to a restaurant, there's a three compartment sink, right? There's there's a sink that has three compartments. You dump in the dirty dishes, you clean the dirty dishes, and you put it in the clean water area before you dry and put it on the shelf. The three compartment sink is a a stage of cleaning and cleanliness process. No food vendor have been successful enough maybe years down the future when they could minimize a three compartment sink have a cleaning station. So when we have like our street festival, street market um and other activities that people hold or every city whole when you deal with

food you have to have some type of cleaning station. when you deal with like a festival or a big event, health department are able to assist by having a concentrated um cleaning area. For example, um if you have a street market type of facility and they sell food, every four vendors can share one cleaning station, the three compartment six station. So, you put one right in the middle or food vendor or tents and share that. and then the next four will share the next cleaning station, so on and so forth. So, they've stretched it that far. But for those that just drive up with a van or a truck to a street, start setting up tables and chairs, food, selling it, those are not legal. They're not legit. They're not approved by the health department. And for us, once the health department review, vet it, and approve it, we issue the license. We legitimize their business and acknowledge that they're licensed by the state, by the county, and they are approved and licensed by the city. Um, the next slide, please, uh, is the Q&A. And if you have any additional question that you may have, uh before we get the Q&A, the very last page of your handout, it's a result of the survey of the surrounding community. So, Ballin Park being on top, we have Asuza, Pasadena, South Almani, the city of Artisia. I threw it in there because it's the former city I came from. I know the regulation. Um so, uh Carlos was gracious enough to add that in there. La Pointe, Monrovia, Coina, West Coina, Urbandale, and Elmonti. Some has very little to no regulation. Some regulate uh give you an example.

Let's use Pasadena as an example. 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. Our city, uh, our hours of operation is 9 to 8:00 p.m. Um, Artisia, as an example, my former city that I came from is 7:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. in terms of allowable use and operation. There's a lot of these business that operates till like they know less enforcement operate till 2 or 3:00 a.m. in the morning. I I took the liberty of driving to uh San Bernardino once and they're people were telling me you see it lined up very late at night and they said you know these folks stay up till like 3:00 a.m. 4:00 a.m. in the morning and it's just like a food galore for everybody. So this will give you kind of like an overview of how other city regulate. So the standard industry for most cities as you can see in the survey is 1 hour. So you can stay you can park at a location by the time you set up the time you do your sales transaction you have one hour to stay there then you have to move on and that's something that's manageable. Um but it requires a lot of staff enforcement and you know we don't have a an army of PD. We don't have an army of community enhancement officer but our key goal is education and awareness and basically we we don't confiscate anything. We encourage them to move along. Please go to the neighboring cities. Our city doesn't allow for it and uh thank you for your cooperation. That's really the gist of our enforcement. And we of course we don't want to site anybody because they're trying to make a living. But if we have to and let's just say we we give reasonable time when it comes to

enforcement. Uh we would go by and we say uh please wrap it up. I'll give you an hour. When I come back hopefully everything is clean, clear, and on the way. Um I know quite a few of the council receive texts and updates with regards to the complaint that comes in, with regards to the action that's taken. Um our staff does an amazing job in in addition to our fellow colleague or uh with the chief's team sometime they assist as well when uh especially on Sundays to address these stuff. And you know I know Carlos and our team would basically send an send me and and even Manny a text a before or current and after. Yes, this is the proof that we've addressed it. They've cleared it. Here's a before and after picture and it's done. We thanked them and we moved on and and our officer thanked the people for basically complying to the requests. um for many for many situation you know we feel the compassionate uh situation of folks and and their arrangement but we also need to enforce the code and law and the sanitation of for our residents for our community. So with that said I want to open the discussion. Uh we're here to take down notes uh seek direction from the city council and then um see where we're going to go from there whe what type of code amendment uh need to be done or need to be brought back for either further discussion or for action to be considered.

Mayor, thank you for that. Okina, uh go ahead.

Sorry. Uh thanks for the presentation, Okina. I know it's a very complicated issue. So, I just kind of want to go down the list, but I mean for for for beginners, I mean, I think it's really important to stress that these food vending ordinances are pre SB972 and pre SB946. So, these are outdated. They haven't been changed in a very long time, right? All right. So, I think it's really important that you work with legal to make sure that we're updating our our ordinances, make sure that we are up to par with uh state requirements. And then by that also highlighting like the example the the 10-minute, you know, I can only assume that the idea that a truck is going to be for no more than 10 minutes that's applies to something like an ice cream truck. You know, that was never intended. I can't imagine that it was intended for a food truck, right? And so, you know, I know that we've asked and we've asked for a while now to make sure that we pause and that we don't enforce these because they make no sense. And I don't think, at least I personally don't feel or perceive that it makes sense or that it's fair to have street vendors go through these hurdles. So, you said we have six food vendors. So, we've had six food vendors go through all these hurdles to get permitted, registered, and and licensed to do this. And then we're going to go and try to kind of poke at them with these artificial barriers because that's what they become when these are when we are well aware that these ordinances are not reasonable, you know, for a food vendor and we're trying to enforce them on them after we've made them do all these, you know, go through all these hoops. I I don't think that that's it's it comes off a little bit abusive in my opinion. Um, so I mean the idea that we can keep expecting food vendors in 10 minutes to serve a plate and move and then serve a plate again, it's just not going to make any sense. Um, you know, I know that you mentioned um the So, I know that you get complaints from from residents and you know, I think that honestly there's just residents that are not in agreeance with street vending and that's entirely up to them. Um, you know, but we do have to

make sure that we're equal for everybody and if there's a as long as we've set some regulations that are fair and they're following them that a resident doesn't want to support street vending, then they don't have to support street vending. Um, I know that we worry about the eeries, but the truth is that, you know, for example, Hibachi, if I'm going to buy Hibachi, I was never considering going to a drive-thru in the first place because the price points are just not the same, right? The quality of the food is not the same. Um, you know, we live in a food desert. Like Park is a food desert, right? Uh and so food trucks are not exactly a uh problem. They can be an opportunity to make sure that that that residents have a uh options to eat that our streets are lit up after 6:00, right? It's one of the things that we talk about where, you know, our downtown shuts down at 6:00 or everything shuts down at 6:00. You know, having uh I mean having street vendors can can be to an extent a benefit and they do collect taxes. I I personally have purchased from a Hibbachi girl and I swipe my card and I get a receipt and I know that they are collecting taxes on those. So, you know, there's a lot of uh myths to the spell, I believe, uh on this topic. Um those are some of the things that I that I wanted to ask. And also, you know, we've we've also asked in the past that we, you know, treat our street vendors with respect and dignity regardless of whether they are permitted or not. And uh one of the things that we've been very vocal on at least in the past is that making sure that we're not dumping their food or that we're confiscating it. You know I you know just in general I think it looks really bad. It puts them in a weird it puts our staff in a weird position. You know it it creates you know just potentially escalate issues and especially with this current atmosphere. We don't want to be engaging in that type of action, nor do we want to be seen in that limelight, especially as law enforcement or just uh you know, any sort of enforcement in general. So, I think it's really important that we're careful, that we're respectful to our street vendors. We're also just keeping the the the conversation, you know, data focused, right? Uh making sure that we're not

going based off of feelings and emotions, but just actually looking at what needs to be done and what can be done. And like I said in a in a fair in a fair way that gives people the opportunity to to uh make a living especially when they've gone through those uh expectations that we that we have of them. Thank you for that council member. Go ahead ca.

Thank you. Thank you Okina for the presentation. Um I I feel the same about the well the truck vendors. I would love it if we could limit the number of trucks, but you're saying it's a state law that does we can't not allow them to limit them. Um, the good thing about the food trucks is that they do have to have a license. They have to have a city license. They have to have a health license to operate in the city. I do feel that those 10 minutes I want to express the same feeling that those 10 minutes park to be able to prepare food, it it's unreasonable. we need to provide even an hour to me is unreasonable because if you're in the middle of an order and your time's up, it just does not make any sense. So, I believe we need to work on that on the time that they should be allowed to be out there. Street vending is very controversial. Um, however, we're talking about different uh street vendors. These are vendors that are fully licensed. So, it does make a difference how they're operating. when they're not licensed, we're actually putting the the city in a liability situation when we have vendors with no licenses. So, actually having the trucks with the licenses is is important. They do uh generate taxes as council member Estrada said. So, I think just working with the time limit that they should be parked and make sure that uh we provide an area that it's not blocking any driveways or not blocking any access to any businesses or especially restaurants is extremely important. So, we need to work on that. Um, as far as truck uh vending, I think we have brought this up in the past about even promoting events with truck vendors where we have I mean Soal is a a great place right now or even we talked about the Metroink station where we invite truck uh street vendors in their

trucks fully licensed and have a food vending event. uh we can uh generate tax money by selling if we would not um it wouldn't be like like the parks or anything like that, but we would have just events to promote the street vendors that are licensed here in the city. And I think council member Estrada had brought this up in the past. So maybe we can still look into that to promote the street vending and so the community can see that these vendors are legitimate. They're licensed. They're clean. they're approved by the health department. I think that would be a great idea. But again, let's work on the time that they are to be parked in the areas because I think they need more time to be able to sell their food.

Yeah, I was just going to piggyback on that. I mean, there isn't any clear case on it yet, but I think what is clear is that a total ban is not allowed. And there was there is at least one superior court case where uh they were challenging I think in that case it was a 30 minute and a even had an hour limit in it and they determined that was not there was no rational basis for that type of limitation that short that that so I think what you're talking about right now is probably more in line with what um the courts are going to want some kind of reasonable period of time because it's regulated we we're allowed to require these permits but we can't require anything more than what's um already like the health issue is already governed. So that's not something we can get involved in. So requiring a license, requiring a business license and for the city um you know just typical registration things like that. But uh we could ban it in a particular area but we'd have to allow it somewhere else. I just wanted to throw that in there that I think we need to come up with a reasonable plan. the events is a great way that I think people, as a matter of fact, those food trucks often, in my experience, they um they work together and they they communicate. There's going to be an event at such and such place and they they go to that place and they every Thursday they're there, you know, and they kind of talk together. So, it becomes an event that people um on social media go to and get gets marketed. So Christian, just for clarification, so we can't put a maximum allowed food vendors within our community.

I don't think you could put a maximum because I think it's more about time, place, and manner. Okay. It's like, you know, okay, that is not a good location. We're going to not allow them in the on city, you know, residential streets, for example. Correct. Okay. you know. Uh but

so sorry I just wanted to add um so really important. So something to look at too is the city of LA. I mean city of LA is kind of the ground zero for everything and anything that comes to this area, right? And so uh city of LA had a a lawsuit in 2023 about their uh no vending zones. So something to look into. I don't know how what the outcome of that was, but they also had a uh pilot for special vendetting zones, which I think is what you are all referring to. So, just making sure that we're, you know, keeping ahead. Um, and also really uh education is really really important. I I have uh I know that we're I I was aware that we're going to start heading into this conversation. I did start connecting with like uh the LA County uh Department of Economic Opportunity. I know that they have uh you know they have their efforts to educate on like microenter enterprises which are makeo not obviously not food vendors not truck vendors but one of the issues that I think that were that you know intersects with this and that aligns with it uh so a lot of uh I think it's important to make sure that we're having those conversations with our street vendors with our you know entrepreneurs that are interested in this because we want to make sure that we get them to be legal and then you know the the more we help them to be legal the or we benefit from them being legit businesses, right? So, I just wanted to bring up those points. And then, of course, I know that we're trying to limit spaces. So, one of the things that I that I that I really think is important is that if you start setting these parameters as to, you know, you can't be, you know, 500 feet from this this curb or you can't be 200 feet from a school, you know, where you're going to we need to have a map where we can pinpoint and tell these people, these vendors where they can be because if I give you a puzzle and you have to figure out all these hints, then where they'll never know where they can be, right? So um and you know Ballpark is a small very small city 7 square miles so a lot a lot of the times you know commercial areas are right behind residential areas right so a lot of these uh things could right we don't want to have a guessing game with them

and then they feel like we're just kind of targeting them so we have all these places that we're kind of setting then we want to be able to say hey you can you can bend you can street vend here right we don't want them to have to guess be specific again in the areas that we're that we're choosing Thank you for that, Council Ma. Um, Council Mean or Mayor Prom Ayella, just have any questions or comments?

I I just have a a couple comments. Um, first of all, thank you, Okina, for the presentation as well. Um, I agree in terms of the time frame. Um, you know, not limiting, you know, obviously to that 10-minute, uh, it's not very realistic. Um, and then also, um, my my main concern would not necessarily be a school or anything of that sort. It would be more of, um, kind of like making sure that they're not next to a business of their kind. So, if it's, you know, selling tacos, I don't want them, you know, directly next to a a location like that. That would be my concern. um that it's not with a business, you know, like a like business because I know even in planning when you you're opening a business, you don't want to be, you know, pizza joint right next to a pizza joint. So, um I think that's defeating the purpose. But, um other than that, I I'm I'm open to allowing them as long as they're cleared and all of that stuff. Um but then taking off that 10-minute unrealistic um time frame. Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor Time. Council Lozano. Yeah, I I just wanted to say that about two months ago I went to one in LA off a street called Broadway and Figuroa in the Lincoln Heights Cypress Park area and they had about maybe 30 40 trucks all unique, you know, and it's it's interesting, you know, to go to different places and it just seems like you get all this crowd that just congregates there, right? So obviously you haven't experienced that, you'd have to because it's really interesting but yes it does. It does. But but but then overlooking what we have obviously you know this their state county city whatever ordinances so obviously we have to work with them and uh the location part the only ones I really ever see are the ones right there right next to uh Target those two that are there right and because you said there's a total of six or maybe they and then there was one that got set up with the whole lamps and all by the um that coffee place across from the In-N-Out Burger

oh yeah right there one time one time but on that I mean I'm not seem like scattered throughout the city. At least that's my Bitcoin. I'm missing some. Yeah, we see it throughout the community. Yeah, I haven't I've only seen the two food trucks uh over by Target. Yeah. So, when you said six, I'm like, where the other four at? Cuz I haven't seen them. So, so usually food trucks are they're where they make their money is when they're mobile, when they're moving. So, let me give you a walk through cuz some city restrict or regulate like it could go into an industrial park where there's uh where there's a manufacturing facility or industrial facility. Oh, you mean more like the lunch trucks?

Yeah, the lunch truck type of deal. That's their bread and butter. That's who they cater to their clientele. Um, got it.

Food truck, food vendor. It's a very controversial topic. If you ask a fixed location business, they'll give you their viewpoints. You ask food truck folks, they give you their viewpoint and the viewpoint is opposite of each other, right? Um, and also like council member yella was saying or mayor protella was saying, you know, her concern is not having the same like business. So you have a let's just say a taco restaurant or a restaurant that sells taco and then the restaurant a food truck that sell taco and they park in front of it and blocking their business frontage and competing against them. Yeah, it's not ideal. But the problem with laws and codes is that it's business competition. We can't regulate it because it's restricted. I mean sometimes On the opposite note, certain type of business concentrate together because it brings attract more business. If you don't like my taco, you like that taco. They compete. They get each other clientele, right? Um so we can't restrict those type of aspect and I get the uh the understanding and the meaning of that and and food truck you know started two decades ago when they have they even have TV shows about food trucks. they have, you know, they they did an amazing race with food trucks uh from all over, you know, the United States and even the rural. So, um uh it's there. It's just how do we want to regulate? How how restrictive do we want to regulate? How flexible we want to regulate it? The health and safety aspect is normal. um to one of the comment with regards to confiscating

food uh we the hope that we don't confiscate food we don't we do not confiscate food um I may predate myself sharing with you how old I am but 30 plus years ago one of my senior project was I did two legal garage conversion and enforcement of food trucks And uh this started when you know the push cart type of folks right not these type of food truck and it's it's a touchy ch subject very few agency regulate and confiscate food carts or food itself because they have to dump all the food away and it's a nightmare for storage and enforcement. It it uh one classic example 30 plus years ago, one of my case study cities was city of Elmonte and they were confiscating food carts, dumping foods and so forth that they were so overwhelmed and they have a retrieval process and policy. Nobody come and retrieve it back. They just it's a loss and because they're using people's shopping carts, taking off the name, converting it, what have you. So they were getting so much carts from all different variety from makeshift to shopping carts, what have you, that they don't have a place to store them. Their entire public workshop was filled with them. So what they did was they did a recycling program, salvage the metal, and that's how they were able to get rid of them. So, and I'm not saying to enforce that cuz it's a nightmare to do so. Um, but our staff, our team has been very respectful. Uh, we understand that they're trying to make a living. They're not committing

any crime or anything like that. So, we ask, we ask politely. We respect people and we give them time to abate and uh comply with the code. And 99.9% of the time we have volunteer compliance. And that's very successful. Uh many cities don't have that luxury. They just squat there and sit there and they use the code against them until we get to a point where we're forced to sight or we get assistance from PD or sheriff to help with the uh the enforcement of that. Um but I I think you know for our city I think you I see the compassion on on all sides. uh we just have to find a happy medium on how to do it and we need to enforce our code and our law. There's no point to write the code in a law that we can enforce. And usually when I when I deal with certain things like this, I seek the expertise of the city attorney to draft the code. Not just the city attorney, but the city prosecutor. Writing the code, but enforcing it is another thing. So they work collaboratively. Do we have enough teeth to enforce and do we have enough teeth to pursue the enforcement and the prosecution and abatement of that? So it's a key component. So whatever direction that the council will want to give uh we're here. We're all ears. And

thank you. Thank you for that Okina. So I did have a couple of questions. Um first I don't know if Carlos if you can uh go up to the podium. I wanted to ask in reference to the uh six uh food trucks that we have. Do you know the other four trucks? Have you have you interacted with them? Uh just one Royal Catering going to the industrial commercial. They just 15 minutes and then go to their next destination. And then the other three, do you know if they're also lunch trucks or they're catering trucks as well? Okay. So that that makes sense why we don't really see the other four. Correct.

Because Okay, that's what I wanted to know. Thank you. And then um so I did I did have a couple of of questions and I think this way we can bring something back. But I think what would be wise is for us to uh you know kind of gather all of the all of the comments that council had and let's go down as an example you know vending hours right let's tackle that down. So right now we're currently from 9:00 to 8:00 p.m. So I mean I don't really see vendors out that early. I usually see them in the late afternoon evenings. So, I mean, look, one of the things that we have to do is obviously we want to write this ordinance to where it's fair, it's flexible, but also not to a point where it's going to get out of hand and out of control because I think that now with times there's a lot of people on social media that are following different types of food trucks and if we can get some of those unique food trucks trucks in the city, you know, it'll help us like with council member was saying, you know, our downtown or so when we leave the city council here, it's dead. you know, I drive all the way up main to when I when I get home and it's dead. Everything's pretty much uh dark already. I didn't know that we weren't able to enforce uh as such as Maro Poayella had mentioned where, you know, I wouldn't want a food truck to park in front of a Mexican restaurant if the Mexican restaurants there and it's selling tacos and a food truck comes and parks right in front of it, blocks their storefront. So, what you're saying, Okina, is that we cannot control and legal, maybe you may want to jump on this. So, if there's a food truck that sells tacos, a taco food truck, and it goes and parks in front of a Mexican restaurant who also sells tacos, we cannot enforce that food truck not to park there.

Yeah, I need to actually look at that one. That is the complaint that you frequently hear. You'll get the businesses that will come in and say, "I'm really tired of this." And it's not usually a food truck. It's often one of the sidewalk vendors that locates near their business, and they'll come in. They'll complain about that. Um I I most of the time what I'm finding with the sidewalk ones is that they're not authorized through the county. They're not legal. So they could be enforced against if there's diligent and normally the city partners with the county about the health issue and they get out there and they

they enforce the health requirements in terms of they don't have an appropriate kitchen and and such and and they do confiscate the equipment and that's when you start to see a reduction of those. But um the food trucks, I think those I mean I could be wrong. Um I think it does depend on the city, but um you know they're more mobile. If you give them a place to go, they'll go they'll go there, you know, cuz they do like there there is a um a unifying thing where you know, you have a dessert vehicle and you have, you know, Italian and you have a Mexican vehicle and you get some choices

and maybe a, you know, uh drinks and things like that. They work well together. They like having four trucks, five trucks, you know, or more. And that's where where we would come in and have that good relationship with the truck vendor and talk to them and and have a specific place where they can actually vend and say, "Hey, for your type of food that you're selling, we would prefer that you're in this location." Just have that relationship so that they abide even though we can't make it a law. have a conversation so that hey you know this is a better spot for you because you would be providing a different type of food than they're already offering in this location.

So in the ordinance are you guys are what you guys saying is we propose an ordinance where we're going to have designated areas of the city where we're going to allow these food trucks and anything out of these designated areas they're not permitted to to sell. Is that what you what I'm hearing from you guys from the council? We could do that. Yeah. I mean because look I if we have so obviously we don't want them in residential areas. I I my only thing about that is because Carlos mentioned that some of them are like catering. So they I guess for like future Well I mean I guess those you know what I mean and I think that's what the time 9:00 a.m. to whatever because they you know

well I think like those then those have been around for a long time and it's usually on private property where they're driving onto the factory. Yeah. They're like providing lunch or whatever to those places and they're in and out. They're invited by the owner to be there. Yeah, I I would think. I'm just saying, you know, if we're going to like specify an area, then do they meet that? Do they have to meet that criteria to be in that area? You see what I'm saying?

I think that maybe what we could do is we can kind of separate the two, right? Let me ask you, when they apply for these permits for the for these licenses, do we know if do we know what type of truck it is right off the bat? In other words, are they indicating, hey, we're we're just a lunch truck that comes into the business and leaves, or are we one that parks on your street? Because that is the difference from a regular, you know, lunch truck that does go into private property most of the times, either, you know, construction sites or, you know, fabrics or different different businesses that they provide lunch to their employees versus them actually coming to, you know, park on our streets. So is there a is there something that distinguishes them when they apply for the license?

Um we could typically they identify the type of food or type of activity because they have to identify that when they get the health department approval. Okay.

Um because of the preparation um but usually the name itself give give out the information of what they sell. And I I do apologize uh we made an error. uh we identified on the slide that it was uh six active business and I guess uh mayor we're saying that do we know who they are? If I do have the list from our um business license folks uh if you want to know I will be able to tell you all the names of what's licensed. We have seven seven legal legit uh food vendor truck licenses in the city. If you want the name, I could give you the name and and the name will probably kind of tell it for itself except for one, maybe two that that I can't tell. Would you like that? Okay. AV Ice Cream. It's ice cream truck. Rigo's ice cream. Cala Sweet Inc. Um the Habachi Grill one. The one on the Target that we were talking about. Miguel's ice cream um truck. Garcia Royal Caterer. Don't know what that what type of food they serve.

They're lunch truck.

They're a food truck. They're all food truck. Um Al Farro Ice Cream. So those are the seven. So see, so this is my thing, right? that, you know, those ones that come in, those catering trucks that come into the to the uh businesses to provide lunch for the employees. I mean, I don't really have a problem with those at all because they're they're in and out and they're not in our streets. I think the ones that we need to and I think we need to distinguish the two, right? So, obviously, we can't we can't change the hours and not say 9:00 a.m. because those come during the day. But for me, if I think we want to bring in some type of different type of food trucks, I think 8:00 p.m. we may be limiting ourselves. I think maybe more, you know, 10 p.m. is a little bit more more doable. And, you know, I'll let you know the rest of the council kind of bring that in. But I think that one of the things that we should address is the vending hours. So, if we can go down the list so we can kind of make this quick because we got to go to close session. Um, what what are you guys comfortable with going up to? So, as an example, 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. or what is the latest? Cuz I know weekends, you know, sometimes, especially our younger generations, we did it back in the day. You know, when you go out partying and you want to, you know, right now the the hot spot in Boulder Park is King Taco, but you know, a lot of the times you you come home from from partying and you want to have something good, right? So, a lunch truck would be a good place and if it's 8:00 PM, they're gone, you know? So, what is a good hour for you guys? Do you think it should be Monday through Sunday or do you think maybe 10 p.m. and maybe push it till midnight Fridays and Saturdays? Just kind of throwing some ideas out to you guys to see what you guys can come up with. Um, mayor, I want to I don't know intrude on your reminiscing, but um I I mean I agree. I think that you do it too early, it's not convenient for anybody. And you know, we also want to benefit I said like we said, right, one of the potential benefits is that people are out more. there's when people are out more,

especially later at the night, more eyes on the streets makes the streets better and makes it safer. Yeah. Just puts more eyes out there. Um I think at the very least 10 and then maybe extend it on the weekends, but if it's 10, you know, to be I would think like they stop bending at 10:00 and then they get a leniency time to pick up and fill clean up just because it it has to be convenient for them as well, right? I mean, this is their this is their full-time job to some of them or this is like their their investment. So what would you say on the weekends extended? So weekends would be Friday and Saturday. What would you guys say extend it to? I wouldn't I wouldn't extend it past midnight. 11 12

11 12. Okay. So what do you guys think about Monday through Thursday 9 to 10 and then Fridays and Saturdays? What do you guys think? Either going uh 11 or 12. I I'm I'm good with that and I'm good with either 11 or 12 for the weekends. And we're looking at just the those that are going to be um Yeah. Oh, commercial corridor. I would agree with that because they have more visibility, I think. Um also um these are just like the the food vendors, right? So like the ice cream peoples. Yeah. No, their hours are not till midnight cuz I don't need to hear the link off the street. Yeah. No,

no. They said when I hear it, I'm like, whoa. And that's and that's the reason why I say I think they should designate areas so they're not overflowing into our residential areas, right? Because even even then, even though they don't, you know, they're not coming around with their with their little music. If if I'm down the if I live, you know, there's a taco truck down my street, I don't want all these people parking in front of my house and making all this noise and then probably getting, you know, their food and throwing it in our front yards. So that's the reason why I don't think these should be allowed. I think that's why um CEO Korea um suggested the commercial corridors. Yeah.

Although I I do have a question. I have friends that will book a food truck for a birthday party, maybe uh a pizza truck and in a for a residential home. So would that be allowed to part to be parked in front of the house and would this ordinance affect that food truck vendor? So, I think it should be allowed because if you're if you as a resident, you know, you're having a party, chances are unless your neighbors hate you, you're probably invited to that party, right? But, uh, now the question is, do they if if I if one of us were to rent, like Manny said, a, uh, pizza truck to come to our home, do they have to take out a special permit for that from the city?

No. As long as they have this the food truck license, they could travel through the city. So, no, I was just asking because that way Okay. So then we can exclude those from the ordinance. So in other words, we would allow those within the ordinance. That would be allowed, right?

I would just say that you you don't want to have them on as a general rule because they may get a permit and then now they want to locate on a residential street. So it seems like if you want to hold a special event, we have just like a ministerial permit that they can pull three times a year for a house on a residential street or something like that. I think we probably just need a consensus that they are not selling to the general public. It is for the folks invited to that party. Exactly. Yeah. Okay. So,

sorry, Mayor. So, as you as you address the the areas where they're going to be and then the potential uh special vending zone, I think it's also important to consider, you know, if a street vendor has an opportunity to be on a private lot, then what? Right. So, like let's say the Hibachi truck is offered a space inside of the parking lot at the plaza, then are they now exempt? Are they now able to I mean is that

Well, I think that we need to address it within if if we're going to create a designated areas for them to be in and that is not one of them, then we need to figure out how we would address it if they're in private property, right? So, cuz because there's a lot of there's a lot of moving pieces to this and it's going to take a lot longer. But I think that for now you have the vending hours. We're we're okay with 9 to 10 Monday to Thursday and then uh extending them until midnight Fridays and Saturdays in commercial well they don't I don't think they're going to well I don't know I don't think that they're specifically going to be there that early because they don't really come out that early anyways but only it yeah so it's

um there but but we will stipulate as the attorney said that they would have to pull a permit. Yeah. Okay. We're talking about the residents that would be hosting the event.

No, no, no. So, so this is so this is basically, you know, because we have those vendors that go into the the businesses to provide lunch during the day. Then I think the ones that we're targeting more are going to be the ones that normally are out in the evening on our streets, right? And then Manny brought up a good point about whether if a resident wants to rent a a pizza truck to provide, you know, pizzas for a a private prop uh party. I don't know if, you know, I I kind of agree with council member Aila to where we don't want our residents to jump through hoops either, you know, just to to get a pizza truck or I mean, I'm going to be honest with you, I really haven't seen any of these bagel trucks at parties, but or In and Out. Yeah. I I don't I don't want it to be an inconvenience to our residents. You know what I mean? If if one of us

Sorry, but it sounds like we just have to specify that this ordinance is specifically for, you know, commercially like food vendors selling to the general public.

Exactly. Yes. Yeah. So, I guess, you know, it's basically focusing on those food trucks like the hibachi truck that's out on in front of the Target. So, those are kind of like the ones that we're targeting. Yeah. Without interfering with the ones that are going to the businesses during the day. And then we won't even, you know, broadcast about the pizza trucks to to p private properties, but it's specifically for the vendors that are out on the street selling tacos or hibachi or whatever. So, um, now the second thing is that we need to address as a council is how many hours are we going to allow for these vendors to be out there? So, as an example, yeah, we've extended their hours till midnight on the weekends, but are we going to say, "Okay, we're going to be okay with them coming in from 9:00 a.m. to midnight there, or are we going to give them a certain amount of hours to be there?" So, that's another one that we have to tackle, because that's important, because we definitely don't want them to have to move every 10 minutes. So that's the reason why I think it's important that we figure out a map to where we designate where these trucks are going to be

right now to determine get away with the 10 minutes determine the time that we that we're allowing them. Yeah. So So you wanted to say something like a maximum of Yeah. Like whatever hours. Oh, it's because in Irwwindale they say maximum four hours per day per lot as an example.

Yeah. So, as an example, let's just say they on Friday, right? Are we going to want them to start if they're going to be there till midnight? Are we going to allow them to start at 6:00 p.m. or 8:00 p.m.? Right. So, if they start at 6:00 p.m. to midnight, that's 6 hours. If they start at 8:00 p.m. to midnight, then that's 4 hours. So, we need to be able to to come up with a cap as to how long they're going to be able to be there. Yeah. The operating hours are from 9:00 a.m. to midnight or 9:00 a.m. to 10 p.m. But that doesn't mean we're going to give them, you know, 12 hours to be there. Well, I think moving is going to be out of the well out of the qu I think once they move, they're gone. That's up to them. Whatever.

Yeah. So, that's why I think that we need to come up as a council. Let's come up with an agreement as to how many hours would you say is fair for them to be there. Do we want four hours? Do we want six hours? Mayor, also it sounds like Christian's going to have to, you know, do some diligence and make sure that we can Well, we want to give them kind of our feedback so that they can they can do the research and then bring it back to us and let us know, yes, you can do this. No, you can't do that. Yeah. And I think it would also be beneficial we, you know, set up a a meeting, maybe two council member, staff that we only have two trucks that are actually, you know, selling to the public

to try to better understand, you know, what's what's their process, right? cuz we from our perspective we we only imagine so much of it but we don't know their exact process to how long it takes them to set up what are their what are their hours exactly what are they looking for and so we just want to make sure that we kind of put make them a part of their of this conversation conversation that we have some input from them too as we kind of design it so that we don't have to keep going back and forth

okay so why don't why don't we do this why don't we you know you guys kind of got our feedback already right you guys have the hours from 9 to 10 Monday through Thursday and then 9 to 12 Fridays and Saturdays. Maybe you guys can come up with do 4 hours to be there from Monday through Thursday and then maybe give them 6 hours for Fridays and Saturdays. You see what I mean? Um so that way if they want to be there because the weekends people may, you know, you have those that want to come out at midnight, but you may want to have those families that want to come in a little earlier at 6 p.m. So we maybe do four hours and 6 hours. May we Oh, yeah. Okay.

And we uh skipped Sunday, so I'm assuming Sunday will be considered a Monday. Yeah, Sunday will be a Monday. All right. So, Sunday is in the same It'll be Sunday to Thursday. Yeah, Sunday through Thursday. Yeah. And then 6 hours Friday and Saturday and then it'll be 9 to 10 and then 9 to 12. Okay. Okay. And then work on work on designated areas. Oh, no. It's every day. Monday through So, it's Monday through So, it's Sunday through Well, Sunday's not really considered a weekend because then they'd be at midnight. No, it's Sunday through Thursday.

So, so if I can be help facilitate to be clear for my own purpose and notes. Yeah. So, it looked like Sunday to Thursday, 9:00 a.m. to 10:00 p.m. We're changing from 8 to 10, correct? Friday and Saturday is 9:00 a.m. to 12 a.m. Correct. midnight. Um, and then there's a discussion with regards to these are the hours for food vendors and then you want to separate and distinguish that between ice cream trucks terms of hours operation. Yes. Because like Maya Prom, she doesn't want the little ice cream truck singing in her and

yes, leaving that leaving that going to uh nine to I think it's the noise. We just It's the noise is the issue. So no noise unless summer except during these hours something like that.

Also we need to double check and make sure there is no workaround. So, if there is a vendor that rents a private lot that they cannot be there 24 hours a day or unless that's council's wishes. Yeah. So, bring that back and then um and then it's going to be okay now 4 hours. So, they're going to be allowed to be there for 4 hours from Sunday through Thursday and then they'll be allowed to be there for 6 hours Fridays and Saturdays. Yeah, I got that with regards to the hour limit. Yeah. But going back to the ice cream, you want to leave that as 9 to 8 like like the way it is. Yes.

Okay. And these are and and and let's distinguish this. These are the these are the ice cream trucks that are driving around. So it won't pertain to if it's a food truck that sells ice cream that wants to park at a location. You see the distinguishment there? Definitely. And then um and then if you guys could just come up with designated areas. I've always thought that a good location would be Bogart here, especially on the weekends because they can park at the at the transit center. Major arterials. What's that? Are you referring to like major arterials?

I travel. Yeah, but then again, we don't really want them too close to the freeways either because Well, yeah. I mean you have that's what but that's what I'm saying like designated areas like Bogar can be I'm I'm just mentioning that Bulgar could be one of them because if our community wants to park somewhere they can park there and my other reasoning behind that is I just want to liven up the soalo so if you know maybe somebody will grab an ice cream and walk over to the soalo or whatever just kind of you know liven this place up because you go down downtown and it's dead. So what we can do as staff, we we got some direction here. We'll work around to create a summary overview. We'll generate a map overview of restricted area or allowable area and we pull another quick study session for you to go over and clarify the direction.

Yes, please. So that way you could fine-tune the district, the area, add, subtract, and then clarify these parameters what we have and then you could always make some minor tweak and adjustment thereafter. Yeah.

Yeah. I would I would I think that's good to just get general guidance because we need to look at what other cities are doing and what's been successful. I think part of the issue there was let's say when they do gather a lot of times it's on private property. Uh I've seen them in shopping centers where the shopping center isn't let's say that active and they're trying to bring in business so that it might be something where that shopping center comes to us and gets a permit so that they could be here every Thursday and so we have chance for fire right typically fire can check the you know

typically situation like that let's just say a struggling shopping center they want to help promote the center by bringing food trucks a variety of food trucks they have the mechanism the ability willing to apply for a temporary use permit. I just say we want to hold a food truck event for Wednesday night because it's hump day and it's the slowest day. We want to or every Wednesday week activity.

Yeah. The time restriction then they have they have that mechanism to do that but the parameter will be able to give them. And then on on the food truck uh topic uh really quick um to council member Avia's point is and I don't know who would handle this Manny but let's let's let's focus on maybe bringing in maybe this is an RCS event but maybe what we can do is start off with bringing them to the soalo and kind of have a food truck event there park some food trucks and just um you know come up with some something creative so that we can maybe get some of those food trucks to maybe want to come into the city. All right. All right. So, you guys got some general feedback, right? Anybody else have any No. Okay, that's it. Thank you so much, Aina Carlos. Appreciate it.

Thank you. All right. So, now we're going to go ahead and recess into a close session.