| By Neil Johnson, Reporter/Anchor, Big Radio |
A local food truck owner is asking the city of Janesville to take it easy on the licensing fees.
Chantel Karavan owns Iron Salamander, a Beloit food truck. She says Janesville charges $530 for an initial food truck license – an amount that’s at least double what other area cities charge for food truck permits.
Cities like Beloit, Milwaukee, Madison and Rockford charge hundreds less a year for food truck licenses. Neighboring Milton doesn’t even charge a fee.
Karavan says the higher costs until this year prevented her and her spouse, chef Kevyn Karavan, from bringing their food truck to Janesville.
She thinks the city’s higher up-front license fee, piled on top of state and county health and fire inspection costs, has a chilling effect on other new food truck businesses coming to Janesville.
During public comments at a Janesville city council this week, Karavan asked the city to consider dropping fees to the $150 to $300 range, similar to what other nearby cities charge.
City clerk Lori Stottler tells Big Radio that Karavan actually beat her to the punch this week with her request.
Stottler says this fall, she aims to forward a recommendation to cut initial food truck fees to an annual charge of $250, or a $75 permit to serve food at a multi-day event. That recommendation comes alongside a bevy of changes to other city fees the council will decide on this fall.
Stottler says the city’s initial food truck licensing fee has been in the $500 range since the city set up a regulatory framework for food trucks a decade ago.
She says that since then, city staff has developed a more streamlined permitting and inspection process. That now makes regulating an individual food truck less costly to the city, and that allows the city to offer up a break on licenses.
Stottler also says she’d forward a recommendation that the city adopt a special fee structure for food truck operators who don’t want a full-year license, but instead seek to serve food at local events or festivals.
She’ll recommend a fee of $75 for food trucks attending local events running up to three days.
Karavan said she intends to press for other changes to food truck rules in other cities.
And she said some Wisconsin counties require a food trucks undergo new health inspections, even if an operator had passed a recent health inspection in another, neighboring county. That’s something she’d like to see change.
