A

The Board of Mayor and Aldermen recently passed a food truck ordinance in its first reading following public criticism of the ordinance.

Food truck owner Jason Jones came forward to speak during the public comment section of the meeting, and voice his concerns regarding the ordinance.

“There are two things that we’re looking at,” he said. “We’re looking at getting permission from property owners.”

He said in a lot of cases, businesses leasing the property want food trucks at their stores, but property owners, sometimes from out of state, don’t want food trucks in those places.

“We find it rather difficult to get permission from these out of state owners that are hard to contact,” he said. He was hoping that they might change that requirement to getting permits from leasees only.

Jones was also concerned about the ordinance no longer allowing for permits for events, instead the event planners would get the permits. He said he didn’t agree with those changes, because he felt it didn’t promote health and safety during an event and puts liability on the event coordinator.

He felt it was unfair to not make food trucks go through the permit process if they were showing up for an event, since other vendors had to pay $250 to obtain a yearly permit.

He requested that event food trucks have a smaller permit fee, and that they go through the same process as the rest of the food truck owners, like sex offender list checks and have health and safety information verified.

When the item came to a vote, Mayor Ray Knowis deferred to City Administrator Jason Quick, who said he had nothing further to add.

Alderman Daniel Berry made the motion, Alderman Derick Mann seconded and the motion passed unanimously.