EDITORIAL & OPINION: Ordiance fits wishes of all

Carol Scheman says the proposed changes will help vendors and students alike. Carol Scheman says the proposed changes will help vendors and students alike.Since the early part of this century, vendors have provided a wide variety of food options for students, faculty, staff, and others. Vending is a tradition at the University of Pennsylvania; it is important to us, and we support it. This "migration" to our campus hasn't been good for us, and it hasn't been good for many of the vendors who have provided services for decades. Issues of public health and safety, sanitation, parking and streetscape that have had a deleterious effect on the quality of life. Alone, any of these issues would be cause for concern, and collectively they are serious, but safety is of paramount importance. The fact is, the situation around the entrance of the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania has become intolerable. Vendors block access to and egress from emergency rooms and the hospital; patients complain about an inability to walk unimpeded into the hospital. Vending trucks on the streets cause traffic bottlenecks and impede ambulance access. It doesn't stop there. Vending trucks with propane tanks and generators present very real hazards; we avoided a near catastrophe a year ago when a gasoline generator caught fire at 36th and Walnut streets. Students walking into Spruce and Walnut streets between vending trucks are always at risk; we have been fortunate that more haven't been hurt. And vending trucks parked along sidewalks at night have become "cover" for criminals; four of our students can speak to that. We have been working for more than a year, with safety utmost in our minds, to develop a comprehensive vending ordinance to improve, not eliminate, vending in our community. The University City Vending Ordinance establishes a district with a maximum of 75 vendors located on public right-of-ways. It will prohibit trucks on certain blocks and replace trucks with vending carts. Additionally, Penn will provide on-campus sites for approximately 16 additional vendors. The ordinance will provide for a total of 91 vendors, about the same number of vendors that now operate on city streets. The ordinance creates an advisory board -- composed of vendors, the business community, and neighborhood residents -- that will establish vending sites on the right-of-ways and select vendors for those sites, based upon seniority and other criteria selected by the board. The proposed changes in vending have caused some concern among vendors and within our own community. Some have objected to process, others to substance. As to process, we have worked hard to speak with and listen to as many affected constituencies as possible. Some groups have argued that they have been excluded. If that is so, it certainly is regrettable, and was not intentional. There were multiple meetings with each University constituency with elected representation for thorough briefings on the problems we had identified and the solutions we were proposing. We tried also to communicate through all available media, including The Daily Pennsylvanian. We met with as widely representative a group of vendors as we could assemble with an emphasis on including those vendors who have served the community the longest. The vending community was not well organized, and it has made our task difficult. Since the last meeting with vendors two weeks ago, a group and leadership has emerged but some of their proposals -- including vending carts up and down Locust Walk and vending trucks parked on the interior space on Superblock -- are not acceptable. Nevertheless, we believe that, through working with our city councilwoman, Jannie Blackwell, the University may be able to accommodate some other ideas. Vending will continue to be available at the University of Pennsylvania. No one would need to walk farther than a block to purchase food from a street vendor. We think this ordinance will do it better, and doing it better has been and continues to be our goal.