U., vendors reach agreement without pesky UCVA, PCA

The controversy over a proposed city ordinance to regulate vending on and around campus is finally over, with a compromise that will turn Locust Walk into the vending epicenter of University City. In a surprise turn of events, a coalition of individual vendors approached University administrators and City Councilwoman Jannie Blackwell late last night and engineered a last-minute agreement. While the new ordinance still removes vendors from most streets and sidewalks around campus, it places all the trucks and carts displaced by the ordinance along Locust Walk. The ordinance, which City Council is scheduled to vote on Thursday, seemed destined to go down to defeat after a previous version prompted a large outcry from community members and vending groups. But Blackwell said she now expects it to pass easily. "This deal makes everyone happy," Blackwell said. "The vendors are no longer on Penn's crowded streets, but they still have a highly visible presence on campus." Jack Shannon, the University's top economic-development official, said the administration is also very pleased with the new proposal. "Now we don't even have to pretend we are building those food plazas anymore," he said. "I was getting tired of announcing locations and then canceling them two days later." The settlement talks began last night at 11 p.m. when the owners of Rami's food truck, Kim's Oriental Food and Greek Lady Olga met with Shannon and Blackwell at the Wawa at 38th and Spruce streets. The agreement was reached after two hours of negotiations and frequent cellular-phone calls to each of the three Le Anhs. The old ordinance proposal, which banned vendors from locations such as much of Walnut and Spruce Streets, would have deprived many students of the chance to buy conveniently-located Chinese food and fruit salad. While the new ordinance retains all the location restrictions, it also calls for all sculptures and trees along Locust Walk and College Green to be removed and replaced with vendors. "Sure, I'm going to miss the Peace Sign and the seemingly year-round Christmas lights on the trees, but it's all worth it if I can still get my Kung Pao chicken," said Carol Scheman, Penn's vice president for government, community and public affairs. College senior John La Bombard said the vending talks were so intense he was just glad that they "didn't hit my penis." The latest talks did not involve the Penn Consumer Alliance or the University City Vendors Alliance, two groups which had been involved in the conflict up to that point. "We felt that those groups were just getting in the way," said one vendor who asked not to be identified. "If your negotiating strategy is to storm into a meeting that [Penn Executive Vice President] John Fry is having with someone else in order to get his attention, you are not contributing a lot to the process." Uncharacteristically, neither UCVA spokesperson Scott Goldstein nor PCA spokesperson Matt Ruben would comment. In a related development, Shannon said he would recommend that Greek Lady Olga be hired as a guest lecturer in international relations, noting that the "department could use whatever it can get."

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