Councilman Brown Withdraws Food Truck Restriction Bill

WJCT News | By Lindsey Kilbride

Published November 24, 2015 at 9:47 PM EST

Under the proposed bill food trucks like Mother Truckin' Pizza would have not been allowed to operate within 50 feet of a brick-and-mortar restaurant without the restaurant owner's written permission.

An ordinance to regulate where food trucks can operate in Jacksonville was withdrawn from consideration at Tuesday night’s City Council meeting.

Councilman Reggie Brown’s proposal would require food trucks to set up at least 50 feet away from brick and mortar restaurants unless they’re given written consent by the owner to be there. Food trucks downtown already adhere to similar rules.

Brown says the problem with his bill was that the language was too ambiguous.

“When I started to look at the proposal I couldn’t answer the simple questions like the point of entrance,” Brown said. “Are we talking about the door, the front door? Are we talking about the driveway?”

That's when he decided to withdraw the bill. But he says the problem is not going to go away.

Brown said, “I want to make sure that again the brick and mortars are able to survive because I’m telling you if they can’t survive we’re going to have a vacant building in our community. And we don’t need anymore vacant buildings within District 10. I have to speak for District 10 now. We have a food desert already. We have restaurants closing up, businesses closing.”

Brown says 90 percent of food trucks play fair; it’s the rest that need reigning in. And, he says, he plans to bring up the issue again in the future.