The Jamestown City Council discussing outdoor dining options to assist businesses as they reopen following the COVID-19 pandemic.

The Jamestown City Council discussed proposed ordinance changes that could assist downtown restaurants following the COVID-19 pandemic.

Elliott Raimondo, city corporation counsel, started the discussion Monday about outdoor dining changes that could be made to allow for mobile food trucks or carts downtown. He said the changes were modeled on how other cities allow for businesses to uses either food trucks or carts.

One aspect of the proposed changes discussed by the council is how close to another restaurant could a food truck or cart be located. The proposal had that a food truck or cart could not be within 100 feet of another local business, unless the owner of the food truck or cart already had an established business in that location. Kim Ecklund, At-Large councilwoman, said 100 feet is not very far away and worried about already established restaurants being affected by a food truck or cart being located so close.

“We need to support our local businesses and make sure they are protected first,” she said.

Mayor Eddie Sundquist said city officials could add a consent agreement from other local businesses allowing for the food truck or cart as part of the permitting process. Raimondo said the city’s special events permit currently doesn’t allow for a food truck or cart to be within 500 feet of another local restaurant. He also said the council’s Public Safety Committee would have final approval of all food truck or cart permit applications. He added that city officials are still working on how much someone would have to pay for the permit.

Sundquist said four local businesses have shown interest in the possibility of owning a food truck or cart. He said one is a catering business that doesn’t have a first floor location. He said the other interested parties would like to have the option of trying to sell their products in other areas of the city. He added others would just like a cart outside of their business location.

City officials also discussed the possibility of allowing parklets at downtown businesses. A parklet is a platform that would be used on parking locations outside of a restaurant to allow the business to have more room to seat customers.

Sundquist said it would be a pilot program and restaurants that serve alcohol would be allowed on the parklets, according to the state liquor authority.

Crystal Surdyk, city development director, said she has modeled the city’s pilot program on other parklet operations from across the country. She said the idea is somewhat new in New York state, but in other areas of the country, especially out west, parklets have been around for about 10 years.

“We’ve done our best to customize it for our community,” she said. “We know we haven’t done this before. We want to introduce this to support our businesses that are struggling. We have very few that are conducive to outdoor dining.”

Surdyk said the permit for a parklet would be $75, plus $200 for each parking space that would be used. She said no handicapped parking spaces would be used for a parklet.

Sundquist said the only other city in the state with a parklet program is New York City.

“We our excited to offer this to our businesses and restaurants,” he said.

In other business, Sundquist gave an update on the ambulance service request for proposals process that was started before the COVID-19 pandemic. Sundquist said city officials are still working on trying to find a new ambulance service provider. He said city officials will provide an update on their process during the next council work session meeting on Monday, June 22.