Unsurprisingly, names have started to surface as possible
applicants for Penny Rich's open Town Council seat once she leaves her post to
join the County Commission in January. Today I heard via Twitter that George
Gianciolo and Jon DeHart likely plan to apply for the position.
While I'm sure either of these men would provide a
thoughtful voice for Council, the unpleasant reality is that if either were
appointed, the gender breakdown of CHTC would be just two women and seven men
(including Mayor Kleinschmidt). Council would be comprised of just 22%
women, exactly the same representation as the NC legislature.
It's
embarrassing that a municipal government we proudly consider to be a model for
progressivism in our state could possibly have the same gender breakdown as our
backward-thinking General Assembly.
I support environmental protection and the mitigation of global climate change. I do not believe that every business should be allowed to do what they what. But there are times when government is in the wrong and shouldn’t kowtow to existing businesses and their supporting organizations at the cost of new business. So to kick this post off I’m going to reclaim a bit of conservative rhetoric. Because it applies in this situation.
It should not be the job of the Town of Chapel Hill to pick which business succeeds and which fails. But this is what they are doing by aggressively regulating food trucks away from the streets of Chapel Hill. It’s called protectionism. The result of the Town of Chapel Hill food truck ordinance is protecting existing brick and motar businesses from competition with food trucks. This is accomplished by charging a fee that is unaffordable to food trucks. The fact that almost no food truck owners will pay the Town fee to provide services in our Town is evidence of that.
![[Meg's Twitter picture]](https://si0.twimg.com/profile_images/2224927233/photo.jpg)
Meg McGurk has taken the helm of the Chapel Hill Downtown Partnership after five years as its assistant director. I have worked with Meg for four years in the planning of Project Connect, an annual event where persons at risk for homelessness and those experiencing homelessness can receive services. Meg and I recently talked about her goals for the Downtown Partnership now that she is its executive director, including her thoughts about arts-driven economic development, parking, panhandling, vacant buildings, and new development.
In January of 2012, after more than a year of debate, discussion, and deliberation about food trucks in Chapel Hill, the Town Council finally passed an ordinance to allow them in our community.
But then no food trucks came.
I’ve spent the last two months talking to food truck owners, local businesses, advocates, and town staff about our ordinance. While there is still disagreement, it seems clear that there is one thing we can all agree on: Our food truck ordinance is not working. I think this is because we didn’t understand the regional economy of the food truck industry in the Triangle. In Durham, food trucks thrive because the community has embraced the food truck business model, and empty parking lots in downtown become natural gathering places for this model of food delivery.
Chapel Hill feared that opening the door to food trucks would provide too much competition to brick and mortar restaurants. We were also concerned that the number of food truck applicants would overwhelm our staff’s ability to review and inspect them. No matter how we write our ordinance, I don’t believe either of those things will happen.
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