Food Truck Operations within the City of Melrose Ordinance. Proposed Ordinance relative to Food Truck Operations within the City of Melrose. (ID# 12951)

Transcript (~13 min @ 1:53)

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▶ 1:53 Maya Jamaleddine: Um, the first, uh, and only, uh, item on our agenda is ordinance ID number 2025 dash 1 23, food truck operation within the City of Merose ordinance, proposed ordinance relative to food truck operations within the city of Merose. ID number 1, 2, 9 5 1. I will open it. Um, I know that we had, um, multiple, um, just for the record, we had, um, approved the, uh, recommendation and amendments, uh, from, uh, the council, uh, during our previous meeting. And we had some amendments and we had, uh, attached new zoning, um, uh, to the, uh, agenda. I will open it for Councillor Pinocchio, um, to share some updates. And for the record, um, uh, president Elli has joined us.

▶ 2:54 Cal Finocchiaro: Thank you, chair Jamal. So, the, um, version that we're looking at tonight is the clean most recent version from, uh, the city solicitor made edits, and we reviewed them last meeting. And so now this is the clean copy. Um, so this is the most UpToDate version. Um, and then today, um, a, a map of proposed location slash zones for food trucks, um, was added. Um, this map will be submitted to the traffic commission for their agenda on their agenda for December meeting. I think they meet December 17th. Um, and we'll kind of take it from there. Um, and it's gonna go through a series of departments. Um, but we're gonna start with the traffic commission. So if anybody has any questions about the proposed locations, there's one, um, potentially at the Knoll. There's one between Winthrop Street and East Emerson, which is sort of near f your art area.

▶ 4:00 Cal Finocchiaro: Um, there's an area around pine banks sort of corners, the main Street and Silver Street area. And then, um, also added, uh, I spoke to the city solicitor today, um, a location directly in front of the brewery, um, because they're going to be, um, wanting, you know, to have an abundance of food trucks there. They do fall into that, um, outside of that 200 foot rule, with exception of dunk and donuts. So, um, so yeah, so 1, 2, 3, 4 locations proposed. Um, I just wanted to show the council that we are, you know, moving forward with getting these locations and zones looked at and approved. And they will be listed on the permit application with Claire, um, instructions to the mobile food vendor that comes in for a permit.

▶ 4:50 Maya Jamaleddine: Awesome, thank you. Any, um, colleagues,

▶ 4:55 Maya Jamaleddine: like co-sponsor colleagues would like to add any comments?

▶ 5:01 Speaker 1: I'm good, thank you. Okay.

▶ 5:02 Maya Jamaleddine: Um, I have, um, counselor gpe.

▶ 5:07 Mark Garipay: I haven't had a chance to read, really take a good look at this. Um, but I do through the chair to the makers, um, the edits today. Uh, anything else other than any other changes from last week other than the amendment? Uh, the 200 feet that we made city solicited did not make any changes to the order. No. After we left the last meeting,

▶ 5:31 Cal Finocchiaro: There are no more additions. Nope. Okay. Just the 200 feet. And then the map was a proposed map, which is Okay, Just for your information.

▶ 5:41 Mark Garipay: And just one quick question on, um, Winthrop Street to Emerson. Um, we thought anyway, anywhere, I don't know if that's in the street right here, but in front of Memorial Hall, I think there's any, like, moving it down a little bit, um, to make it in front of Memorial Hall. Uh, I don't know if that's a street or not in the parking lot here, or,

▶ 6:06 Ryan Williams: Go ahead. Um, thanks to the chair. I, that's something we can discuss. I'm on the traffic commission, so that's something I'll bring up when we get to the traffic commission meeting for sure. Thank you.

▶ 6:15 Mark Garipay: And these are the, uh, locations that are in front of the traffic commission right now?

▶ 6:19 Cal Finocchiaro: Not yet. Um, sorry, go ahead. Go ahead. Um,

▶ 6:24 Speaker 2: Per the chair, sorry.

▶ 6:25 Cal Finocchiaro: I wanted to, I'm gonna send it to them to be added to their agenda after this meeting. I wanted, um, the counselors to review it first and kind of give their opinion or, and then, um, it will go to their, I'll send it to them. We'll send it to them this week.

▶ 6:42 Mark Garipay: Is there any anticipation that there'll be additional locations added to the traffic commission? Um, this is what we're going, this is what's gonna be proposed, if any,

▶ 6:51 Cal Finocchiaro: If anything, I think there might be some deleted, maybe like, maybe the null won't be feasible because that we have to figure out if that's a park or a school property and how that, um, works. So if, if anything, uh, no, no additional areas will be added, I'm assuming. Correct. Conser Williams,

▶ 7:09 Ryan Williams: Uh, through the chair. The, uh, traffic commission is free to do its own thing. But I, uh, the conversations that we've had with the chair of the traffic commission are that they're going to take a really sort of judicious look at this and think through all of the questions you've had and the feedback. And, um, so I don't anticipate that there will be much broader than this. If anything, you might go to like a small zone and they're gonna discuss, my expectation would be that they're gonna discuss how to functionally roll this out. Like, you know, what do you, do? You put up a special sign, do you just tell the vendors this isn't space that they can by parking code, they can overstay if they're this use or something. However, that works out the nuts and bolts of it

▶ 7:50 Mark Garipay: Through the chair. Uh, you don't anticipate making any changes as a member of the traffic commission. This is what you're, you're gonna, uh, propose and support.

▶ 8:01 Speaker 1: I'll support that. Yeah. Yeah,

▶ 8:04 Speaker 2: I think I'm pretty good right now.

▶ 8:06 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank You. Any other question? Counselor? Vandiver? Uh, thank you.

▶ 8:09 Kimberly Vandiver: Chair Jamine, uh, thank you. Councillor Occhio and, uh, Williams and Ro Ramil for coming with this additional information. Um, I'm just trying to visualize a couple of these locations. I love that there's one near Pine Banks Park, because that's a place that people spend a lot of time. I'm just looking at that location and trying to visualize where the truck would actually go, because on Main Street, there's a right turn lane right there. Mm-hmm. And I mean, maybe there's a little bit of space on the cross street, but I'm not sure on the main Street side where they would like functionally park themselves. Um, and there's also this fence here, so like, once you get your food, you need to walk a fair distance to get anywhere. I, I mean, I guess you could go across towards, so I just wanted to like, understand a little bit more like what you envision with that one.

▶ 9:01 Cal Finocchiaro: Yep. Through the chair. Uh, this is sort of a proposed zone, and I, I'm, I'm about the understanding that the traffic commission will look at this area and give suggestions, and it might be whittled down to maybe just a spot across the street from Hunts or something. It, it won't, might not be the entire area. Uh, counselor Williams can speak to that more.

▶ 9:25 Speaker 3: Go ahead, counselor Williams.

▶ 9:26 Ryan Williams: Thanks. My, uh, my thought on this is probably that they're gonna suggest Sylvan Street right around the corner from, um, Maine, where there is parking available mm-hmm. For vehicles. Um, and we'll discuss too, how we are thinking, we'll, we'll discuss this issue of like, you wanna put it by pine banks, but Pine banks is privately owned mm-hmm. Land, right? So does Melrose, because it's on our, within our boundaries, do we say, yes, you can put it in the parking lot there, you know, how does that shake out? That's something that we're gonna have to, um, talk through the traffic commission and if it requires additional amendments to the ordinance to make it work, then we'll come back here and figure out how to make it work.

▶ 10:08 Kimberly Vandiver: Okay. Uh, through the chair. Thank you for the clarification. I, I definitely would love to get a spot in that general area, just trying to understand how it would be feasible. And then, um, similarly, uh, the spot on Cory Street, I just, my memory of that street is that it's pretty narrow and in like, how would that exactly look?

▶ 10:30 Cal Finocchiaro: Sorry. The, the, I must have moved the star. It's supposed to be on Main Street in

▶ 10:33 Kimberly Vandiver: Front of the brewery. Okay. Thank you. So it's one, one shifted one to the right. Got it. Yeah. Okay. That makes more sense. Yeah. Okay. Uh, awesome. Then, um, the only other question I had last meeting I had, um, as we were kind of wrapping up, had been talking about the one section about seating where it says that the food truck vendor may not provide or allow seating, um, in the area. I think they called it a dining area, but they gave a lot of examples. Um, so I don't know if that, um, how many people that resonates with, but I, I do think that that would be an improvement for accessibility. I think it's a little bit overly much to have the food vendor, um, not allow anyone to bring their own seating and just as far as enforcement. So, um, I would make mo make an, uh, suggest, propose an amendment, uh, to see if there is interest in that amendment to strike the words or allow, um,

▶ 11:35 Maya Jamaleddine: Do you want to repeat? What's your, what's the amendment?

▶ 11:39 Kimberly Vandiver: Uh, so let me pull up the wording.

▶ 11:47 Kimberly Vandiver: Uh, so my proposal is in, so in the clean draft we're looking at, um, I believe this is page four, uh, 1 27 dash 15 G. Um, mobile food vendors may not provide or allow any dining area, including, but not limited to tables, chairs, booths, bar stools, benches, and standup counters. Uh, so my proposal is to, uh, remove the words or allow from that sentence.

▶ 12:24 Maya Jamaleddine: Is that motion? That's a motion, yes. Um, do we have a second?

▶ 12:35 Maya Jamaleddine: Okay. Okay. Um, I have counselor ro uh, no, I'm sorry. I have counselor Che, um, um, in queue for questions and then that's also, thank you.

▶ 12:48 Speaker 3: Thank you.

▶ 12:50 Manjula Karamcheti: I'm a non-voting member, so just wanna make sure. Yep, that's okay. Okay. Um, this is just like a general question and I apologize 'cause I haven't been following it as closely because I'm not on legal and ledge. Um, but just for, like, regarding the map is, is it true that like, let's say an organization like Follow Your Art or any other in the city, they can still have a food truck for one of their events by applying for a permit. This doesn't, like, take that opportunity away. So food trucks can still be utilized by other organizations that aren't necessarily starred on this map. Just wanna confirm that.

▶ 13:36 Maya Jamaleddine: Councilor Kyra? Yes.

▶ 13:38 Cal Finocchiaro: Through the chair. If you look at, uh, 1 27 dash 13, there's like, um, 1, 2, 3, the fourth paragraph. There are exceptions. Um, really the, it's, it's, it's specifically these licenses are for if we're serving the general public. Yeah. So, um, it's, if it's a private event, they don't fall under that.

▶ 13:59 Manjula Karamcheti: Wonderful, thank you for No problem. Just Yep. Clearing that up for the, for the community. That's

▶ 14:04 Speaker 4: A lot of information in here, so, yeah.

▶ 14:07 Maya Jamaleddine: Thank you. Moving. Um, councilor Vania, did you wanted to add anything? Okay. Um, what is the will of the committee?

▶ 14:20 Speaker 3: Councilor Vandiver? Nope. Do you wanna,

▶ 14:22 Kimberly Vandiver: Do I make a motion to recommend to the vote council?

▶ 14:25 Speaker 1: Second,

▶ 14:27 Maya Jamaleddine: We have a motion to recommend made by Councilor Van Devin, seconded by con uh, vice Chair Romanul on discussion.

▶ 14:37 Maya Jamaleddine: Seeing none. Um, all in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed?

▶ 14:46 Maya Jamaleddine: Okay. This passes, um, to the full council. Um, congrats finally on passing this ordinance, uh, seeing no other items on the agenda. Um, we are now to adjournment. I would, um, uh, entertain motion to adjourn. Um, there is no objection. Seeing none. We turn.