....but it is possible the Kitchen From Hell Will integrate Silly Hall's venture.
Red tape 'choked' cart biz
Food vendors blame city hall
By BRYN WEESE, SUN MEDIA
The city's heavy-handed approach to offering biryani, roti, kebabs, and spring rolls alongside street meat sausages claimed its first victim.
Three months into the three-year Toronto A La Cart pilot project, one of the eight approved vendors closed up shop indefinitely.
Blair Bonivento's Greek food cart offering souvlaki and breakfast sandwiches at Nathan Phillips Square is gone.
"They chose at this point not to open," says Yvonne de Wit, associate director of Toronto Public Health heading up the A La Cart program.
"They're looking at possibly doing some menu alterations, and things like that. I'm hoping they will be back in the fall."
Earlier this summer, two other vendors changed locations because the ones the city chose for them were busts.
One at Queen's Park was next to a cenotaph and another at Roundhouse Park at the base of the CN Tower was in a construction zone.
That very bureaucracy, which sent applicants jumping through hoops and shelling out between $25,000 and $45,000 for city-approved carts and location fees, caught the ire of local politicians, residents and also the city's 300 hot dog vendors, who've been hawking food on the streets for 30 years but were ignored when the idea of expanding street food menus was tested.
"They chose to ostracize our fantastic and ethnically diverse group of people. They want diversity? Well, we have 25 different spoken languages in our membership," says Marianne Moroney, a University Ave. hot dog vendor and executive director of the city's Street Food Vendors Association.
Moroney represents about a third of the city's hot dog vendors.
"Had there been some creative consultation, this could have been a really exciting program. We could have surpassed what Portland and New York are doing," she says. "Instead, we've choked it ... It's really sad."
Bridgette Pinder, who sells jerk chicken and chicken roti at Yonge St. and St. Clair Ave. as part of A La Cart, agrees the program had some "challenges."
'Didn't know process'
Namely, the cart locations and that there are so few of them hindered what she hoped would become a real renaissance of the city's street foodscape.
"We didn't know the process, and I don't think the city anticipated what that process would look like until we got into it," she says. "There is a lot of red tape, and all of that.
"I was hoping that we could be ambassadors for the city if we were strategically placed," Pinder says. "There are a lot of tourists around the city, but not many of them come to Yonge and St. Clair."
The program requires vendors to buy their carts, which range from $21,000 to $28,000, from a specific manufacturer. The city chose the carts and own the rights to the logo.
When the health unit first opened the application process, only 19 people applied for 15 spots. Of those, only eight were considered suitable.
At the time, health unit officials and politicians on its board insisted the onerous regulations were to protect the public.
"Because the foods are new, and nobody in Ontario has ever had these foods on the street ... we wanted to take every single precaution that we could realistically to ensure that the food was safe," de Wit says.
Closely regulated
"Clearly, it's better to start off with something regulated. You can ease off regulation much better than starting off with an open-ended program that you then try to impose regulations upon."
But Coun. Denzil Minnan-Wong says the city went too far to ensure the food is safe.
"Small businesses know how to make their own success," he says.
"It shows how interference from government, red tape and unnecessary costs are driving these businesses away and inhibiting what would otherwise be a success," Minnan-Wong says. "Let vendors do what they do best, without Big Brother peering over their shoulder with one hand in their pocket.
"Culinary success is an organic process that is being thwarted by government involvement," he said.
The city's public health unit has set up an email address, streetfood@toronto.ca, for feedback to help guide the project over the next few years and is awaiting an interim report that de Wit is preparing.
Moroney is hopeful that politicians "go back to the drawing board."
"What should happen is the city (and health board chairman) John Filion should admit they were completely wrong and get together with the important stakeholders and come up with a new program that's going to work," she says.
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ON THE MENU
What to eat where
With one A La Cart vendor closed indefinitely and two others in new locations, here is a list of where the A La Cart vendors can be found, and a sample of what they serve:
- Nathan Phillips Square:Central Asian/Persian -- biryani and salsa karachi.
- University Ave. and College St.: Middle Eastern -- chicken and beef kebab wraps.
- Metro Hall: Afghani/Central Asian -- chapli kabobs and samosas.
- Yonge St. and Eglinton Ave.: Korean -- bulgogi with seasonal kimchi and tokbukki.
- Yonge and St. Clair Ave.: Caribfusion -- jerk chicken wraps and chicken roti.
- Mel Lastman Square: Thai -- thai BBQ and pad thai.
- Yonge and Elmhurst Ave. (near Sheppard Ave.): Eritrean -- souvlaki and injera.
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