The hearing on Street Food in San Francisco, I think, went as well as could be expected.  There was lots of public comment and Supervisor Dufty, the hearing sponsor, seems open to getting feedback from the vendor community regarding the best ways for the city to manage Street Food.

Some relevant comments from the meeting:
“None of these people out selling street food are getting rich. They are just getting by.” -Chile Lindo
“Why do new vendors need these new expensive carts when there are older (mostly hot dog) carts serving perfectly safe food every day in SF who don’t need to upgrade?” -Smitten Ice Cream
“Is the 1500 foot minimum distance from schools really relevant to the food that modern street food vendors are selling?” -Bevan Dufty
“We should begin looking at a process that allows for vending  at time outside of normal daytime hours.” Regina Dick-Endrizzi

Here’s my key take aways for how best to move this process forward:

1. Don’t kill Street Food with Kindness.
The fact is that most street food businesses are not getting their owners rich (even the most popular ones).  By adding increased regulation and oversight to Street Food, SF risks making the financial burden to start a cart even more challenging and unrealistic for these vendors.

2. Mobility and Proximity.
Right now there isn’t good legal locations to serve from and, if you find one, the law doesn’t allow vendors to move around or congregate together (even if they want to). How about some changes that allow vendors the flexibility to move where they want, and sell with whom they want?

3. Reduce the cost of entry.
Its a simple truth: It shouldn’t cost $20,000 in order to build a legal Street Food cart.  Thats just crazy. It is not unheard of for San Francisco to pick and choose the California Law that it enforces. I suggest that without the SF Health Dept reinterpreting Health Code rules under the spirit of the laws, rather than the letter of them, most vendors simply won’t be able to afford to sell legally.  Specifics for this include: Regulating refrigeration temps by duration of service period rather than mandated mechanical refrigeration,  accepting commissary 3 part sinks as an adequate replacement for a cart 3 part sink, and allowing carts operating outdoors to not have commercial ventilation.

On a final note, congrats to Regina Dick-Endrizzi in the Mayor’s Office of Small Business, Nick Kinsey in the Parks Dept, Inspectors Lee and Reyes in the Health Dept., and Dan Sider in the Planning Dept for moving this process from just a task force to something that could provide meaningful legislative reform.

Its going to be an interesting summer.