Cleveland, NC Zoning/Planning Board Continues to Hammer Out Food Truck and Alcohol Guidelines

 

Discussions about food trucks and wine/beer town regulation guidelines continued tonight 8-31-2020 at the scheduled Cleveland, NC zoning and planning board meeting. Proposals on these topics were requested by the Cleveland Town Board, and guidelines hammered out by the committee will ultimately go to the Board for review and possible adoption.

Alcohol Sales (wine/beer only)

The board agreed tonight on a definition of a restaurant which may seem pretty straightforward but can get complicated. 

Members of the committee also were in agreement that beverage sales would be limited to beer and wine with liquor being excluded at restaurants in the town. 

From there, things got more complicated.

The sample copy reviewed allowed for 49% of restaurant sales to be alcohol, but board members weren't keen on sales of beer and wine being that high. Member Jim Brown suggested that the sales limit be at 35%, and board members agreed.  

Committee members discussed the sale of beverages for off premises. This would include sales like a large pizza with a six pack to go. Roy Huss, who previously lived in Pennsylvania, said that was common up north (though not so much in this area currently). With carry out being considered a safer option currently due to coronavirus, local restaurants (and those considering opening in Cleveland) might need/want to know policies on alcohol sales for off premises, so the board did think it should be included. Members did question the impact of to-go throw away packaging and the impact on litter in the community and also issues with measuring sales with both dine-in and carry out purchases. 

Board member Chet Adkins did not think that carry out purchases needed to be included in the percentage of alcohol sales total, because otherwise local restaurants could become, in fact, package stores. If not counted in the total, people could just drive up for alcohol and not support the food portion of any given restaurant. 

Questions about tracking and regulation of alcohol sales (and specifically percentages of sales) took up quite a bit of the hour meeting. The NC ABC board requires quarterly reports from the restaurants. Board members thought that it would be a good idea to require duplicate copies to go to the town clerk of Cleveland.  

One other issue that was addressed was litter from restaurants. More specifically the clean up of the litter was a topic of discussion. Some of the roads in town get a lot of trash tossed out currently, and board members were concerned that it would become more of a problem. Bryan Little noted that Salisbury had a fee to cover trash pick for restaurants, but the maximum fee that could be charged was $15. Salisbury is doing away with the fee, since doing the paperwork cancelled the benefit of charging such a low fee. The group, in light of that, decided that a fee was not worth discussing.

Food Trucks

The main quetstions regarding food trucks which were considered by the board were:

1. What hours should food trucks be allowed to operate?

2. What fees should be charged, and how much should those fees be?

The board did agree that it was not a good idea to allow 24 open hours for food truck operations, but board members were not sure about the hours to specify. Some of the questions about hours related to the work hours of Freightliner which has a first and second shift that would be impacted. In the end, the group decided that 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. seemed reasonable, although that could potentially change.

Members of the group did think that it would make the most sense to allow food trucks to be open the entire time for an event. For example, a festival or music show could run until 11 p.m. or even midnight, and it would not work well to require the food truck to leave earlier than the attendees at the event.  

It was also noted that an individual food truck could request a variance if there was a legitimate reason to be open outside the stated hours. Such a request would come back through the board.

Fees remained up in the air. Members of the board wanted to see some sample fee schedules before setting fees for Cleveland. The town clerk was asked to check about fees. Food trucks would not be paying property taxes like the local restaurants, so members felt that it would be important to charge a fee that would compensate and also be fair to the local restaurant owners.

Also discussed was the issue of garbage. The group seemed pretty firm on requiring any food truck in town to have one or perhaps two trashcans which they would be responsible for. It was also discussed that food trucks would need to use recyclable products so that they would eventually compost if tossed out. 

Discussions were tabled at 6:52, since there were a number of questions that would require research. Little did note that he hoped that the group could have proposals to Town Board for consideration and voting in time for the Cleveland Christmas Parade (which would be the obvious time for food trucks to visit). 

To date there have been two inquires about bringing food trucks to Cleveland including one last week. With policies in place, the number might go up. Mt. Ulla recently had Duck Donuts at West Rowan Farm, Home & Garden store.