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Home My WebLink About11-19-2013 ac schmidt ph1RECË,: Goodwin, Heather From: Sent: To: Subiect: agenda correspondence Jan Howell Marx Mayor of San Luis Obispo (805) 781-7t2o or (91sl s41.-2716 Max, Jan Tuesday, November L9,20L312:26 PM Goodwin, Heather FW: Food Truck agenda item AGENDA CORRESPONDENCE oate t\.Iß-[åtrem#& From : rschmidt@ rain.org Irsch m idt@ rain.org] Sent: Tuesday, November t9,2013 10:38 AM To: Marx, Jan; dcarpen@slocity.org; Ashbaugh, John; Smith, Kathy; Christianson, Carlyn Subject: Food Truck agenda item Re; Food Vending Trucks Agenda ltem Dear City Council, Once again the high-and-mighty we-know-what's-best-for-the-rubes staff comes to you with a proposal to mess up what's left of the livability of our neighborhoods by permitting food vending trucks to operate within residential areas. Shame on them. Now you need to stand up to them and be counted - FOR neighborhoods for a change, or once again against them. Regardless of staff's indifference to the public health consequences of these types of food vendors - and there are many things to be concerned about regarding this third-class method of distributing likely-to-be-harmfulfood -there are many demonstrable reasons why these operations don't belong in residential areas. ONE SUSPECTS THAT ALLOWING THEM lN RESIDENTIAL AREAS lS STAFF'S WAY OF PLACATING RESTAURANT OWNERS (staff regards the Chamber, not residents, as its rightful constituency), WHO LEGITIMATELY DON'T WANT THEM lN COMMERCIAL AREAS NEAR RESTAURANTS. Just throw neighborhoods under the bus once again - staff's modus operandii throughout the present LUCE update - and you refuse to tellstaff to quit it no matter how many times this is pointed out to you, so it must be your plan as well to finish off what's left of the still-livable parts of SLO. A few reasons why food trucks don't belong in neighborhoods: 1. This is rank commercialization of areas that were set aside for the peace, comfort, and quiet of living, lf we wanted to live next to noisy trucks and commerce, we'd not have settled in quiet places like neighborhoods. You will have a whole lot of complaints from the 99% who have no clue all the games you folks are "enacting" once the trucks show up in their neighborhoods. And your response then will be: "We can't do anything. There's nothing illegal about it. They're not breaking the ordinance." So, don't do this. Keep the trucks out of all residential areas. We don't need curbside restaurants in neighborhoods. 2. Attraction of strangers into neighborhoods. How does it benefit a neighborhood to have this type of stranger- attract¡ng hit-and-run business operating within it? This is just one more way to erode neighborhood safety in orderto satisfy the commercial greed of the few. 1 st_0 3. Noise. These trucks aren't quiet. Most have at least a generator, and many have compressors and engines that run constantly. Some may be air conditioned as well. Why should any neighborhood be subjected to this racket for hour after hour so some greedy company can make a few bucks at the expense of residents who want their peace and quiet? 4. Pollution. Any device that's making noise is also generating air pollution. This is stationary source pollution that doesn't belong in a neighborhood. ls there to be no place left where we can escape breathing the health-robbing exhaust ofgas and diesel engines? And what about water pollution? Most of these types of operators have no qualms about dumping their slops in the gutter. Even if they're more or less careful, there will be spills. Creek pollution will inevitably result from this. (One of my long-standing annoyances is the type of business operator we have - like Crushed Grape on El Mercado - who dump their slops into the gutter. l've asked that woman to quit it, but she sneered at my request and keeps right on year after year, and the city does nothing. You can see the stains where she dumps her slops, and that they run right into the gutter and from there into the creek. More city hypocrisy.) 5. Trash. Who cleans up the trash the truck vendor customers leave behind? Who goes out through the neighborhood to clean up the stuff people drop as they eat while walking away? Who cleans up the "window drops" from cars speeding away from the illicit restaurants? (l'm constantly cleaning up stuff from the fast food places on Foothillwhich are a good distance away. This is not a made-up issue, I also fish their crap out of the creek in my backyard.)This is another degradation of neighborhoods, another burden on residents, if they even bother to clean it up. lf they don't, the crap just ends up in the creek, and floats out to the Great Pacific Gyre to augment that vast monument to human greed, stupidity, indifference, and genuflection to "the way things are done." 6. General hubbub. The transactions at food vendors are not silent or even quiet. There's a lot of talk, shouting, etc., car doors opening and closing, engines starting and stopping as people arrive and leave the scene of these hit-and-run restaurant operations. None of these people care a bit about the impacts they have on the neighbors. The neighbors, however, have to put up with it - and no help on that from the city. This sort of activity doesn't belong in neighborhoods. ALLOWING FOOD TRUCKS IN ANY NEIGHBORHOOD OR RESIDENTIAL AREA IS JUST PLAIN WRONG. DON'T GO THERE Thank you Richard Schmidt PS. I find the "state law forces us to do this" argument really stupid. It's just staff manipulation of the council, lf state law is a problem, and you agree on that, do something about it. Katcho would be glad to help. Ask him. PPS. Disease spreading, health-harming food trucks are not in the public health interest. Realizing that, you should seek to limit their existence as much as possible since, according to the Almighty Staff, you cannot regulate health issues directly. Be creative rather than just taking Almighty Staff's word for it. 2