ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (KRQE) — Food trucks and pop-up shops keep becoming more prominent in Albuquerque. Now, the city is sharpening its rules on when vendors need to get permission to set up shop at an event.
Hyder Park is where a well-known food truck event called ‘Tasty Tuesdays’ takes place, but it’s events like these that city officials said have been a breeding ground for fights between permitted and renegade non-permitted vendors.
Heading into summer events, lots of Albuquerque businesses want to serve big crowds. However, the city said rules on who can sell have been a big problem at some gatherings, like Tasty Tuesdays, in local parks.
“Some very unfortunate conflicts between the organizers and other members of the community,” explained Dr. Shelle Sanchez, the city’s Arts and Culture Department director. Sanchez is talking about a longstanding fight between some mobile vendors and special event organizers.
“They invite food trucks from around the city to come, and they work. They save spaces for those invited, planned food trucks, and then there are regular conflicts with other food trucks and vendors that show up and actually take up space that has been permitted already for the event,” Sanchez stated.
One food truck vendor and nonprofit organization, Street Food Institute, saw the problem firsthand last year.
“We had a person who started showing up at the park. Wasn’t part of the rotation. Wasn’t permitted in terms of the process all the trucks had to go through. He became quite aggressive and continued to show up every week,” explained Tina Garcia-Sham, executive director of Street Food Institute, “It got to the point where the organizer called the police. She called somebody from Parks and Rec, and although the police showed up, there was nothing they could do.”
That problem has the city revamping the rules with a new ordinance identifying who can sell at a special event: “You have to be part of an event to actually be participating inside the event as a vendor. Other vendors cannot come in and use that space at the same time,” Sanchez said.
However, some wonder if the city’s new rules go far enough: “I think there needs to be somebody at the city level who has authority to be able to come and say, ‘You’re not allowed to be here,'” Garcia-Sham expressed.
The ordinance also clarifies rules for spontaneous protests versus large, planned gatherings. Protests don’t need permits unless they need three or more city services like road closures, police, or barricades.
City councilors passed this ordinance on Monday. From here, the mayor is expected to sign it, and it could go into effect in the next few weeks.
