There’s a food plan afoot.
Bradenton Beach officials are developing a plan to allow food truck operations, following Anna Maria’s lead and their attempt to comply with 2020 legislation.
In 2020, legislation went into effect to reform and reduce regulation of occupational licensing in the state. One component of House Bill 1193 is that it prohibits municipalities from requiring registration, permits or associated fees for food trucks and similar mobile businesses.
Florida counties and municipalities can regulate mobile businesses through zoning but they cannot ban mobile food vendors in their entirety.
Earlier this summer, Anna Maria commissioners moved to allow a four-space zone for food trucks on city right of way at the northernmost end of Bayfront Park. The proposal remains under consideration.
Meanwhile, at a Bradenton Beach commission meeting Sept. 1, Mayor John Chappie tasked city staff with addressing compliance.
“Staff had some communications today about doing a land development code update,” said city attorney Ricinda Perry, adding that a focus would be to determine appropriate areas for food trucks.
“We wanted to look at quickly going into the land development code and making sure that our residential areas are protected from these types of commercial activities,” Perry said.
She also said food trucks operating on Bridge Street didn’t seem “an ideal situation.”
A better location might be in the commercial area north of Cortez Road — in the area near the Wicked Cantina along Gulf Drive, between Seventh and Ninth streets north.
The land use map shows the area as commercial with mostly business-owned parking lots.
The city has yet to indicate whether it would allow food trucks to operate in the rights of way in the area. If not, food truck operators would have to broker a deal with the parking lot owners.
“You do have to allow food trucks in the city but you can kind of limit where they would be appropriate,” Perry said.
Chappie said, “I’ve been talking with Ricinda for a couple days now about it. We want to be fair about everything but there are certain areas I’m sure we don’t want this activity.”
Perry said the staff intended to bring the issue to the planning and zoning board after a Sept. 14 department head meeting.
The next meeting will be at noon, Thursday, Sept.15, at city hall, 107 Gulf Drive N.