Vending

Woodbury's City Council voted 8-1 last night to adopt stringent restrictions for people seeking to vend on public sidewalks in the city. Under the new ordinance, similar to one passed in Haddonfield last year, vendors must change locations at least 25 feet every every half-hour. Vendors would have to move at least 25 feet every 15 minutes unless they had a line of customers, in which case they could stay stay 15 minutes more before moving. A vendor could not return to the same spot during a 24-hour period.

Center City's 380 street vendors will have to wait until after the summer to find out whether 80 of them will be legislated out of existence. Councilwoman Marian Tasco yesterday held a vending reform bill until after Council's summer recess, because she was unable to muster the nine votes necessary to pass it. The bill would have mapped out 300 locations where vending would be allowed in Center City - from Front Street to 22nd and from Race...

At first glance, it looked as if nothing much had changed last week in the fractious debate over how to reform Philadelphia's largely unregulated street- vending industry. In appearances before City Council, vendors griped that a new system of assigned sidewalk spots would still cramp their style. Meanwhile, a chamber of commerce lobbyist carped about the need to keep east- west blocks in Center City "pristine and uncluttered" by vendors. But wait . . . one . . . minute. While some of the main players continued to fight the long war, a Council committee declared a truce.

The Goode administration's effort to revamp street-vending regulations in Philadelphia was derailed yesterday by City Council members who stalled the bill in committee, saying it was inadequate. City Managing Director James S. White told a joint Council committee that it would take no more than 30 days for city officials to implement the administration's proposal. The bill calls for the establishment of two underground vending malls in Center City, a point system to monitor frequent vending violators and the hiring of nine more inspectors to enforce city vending laws.

Faced with dramatic changes in the nature and number of street vendors, the Goode administration soon will propose a radical overhaul of the city's widely abused laws and regulations on street vending. Drafted by Licenses and Inspections Commissioner Don Kligerman, the proposals seek to balance the often-competing interests of vendors, established businesses, pedestrians and residents in Center City and at neighborhood commercial strips. The proposals, contained in a policy paper that Goode is expected to endorse publicly in the next week or so, start with the widely accepted premise that the present law has led to rampant lawlessness, ineffective enforcement, a cluttered and littered streetscape, and sometimes violent confrontations among vendors.

THE EXPLANATION by City Solicitor Romulo Diaz of the Live 8 vending process made me laugh (letters, July 18). The mayor's brother has his hands deep in the city's pockets. Don't tell me that his company was chosen partly because he is a minority company. Let's call it like it is. He is the mayor's brother, and that's why he got the business. This is the story with this city government. The problem is, everybody just looks the other way. Well, that's not my style. I call it like I see it. What kills me is that you expect the people of this city to swallow what you wrote.

Steven Bodner has won the latest battle in the Haddonfield hot-dog wars. The Appellate Division of New Jersey Superior Court this week upheld a lower court ruling that Haddonfield's zoning ordinance, which prohibits street vending in its business district, is unconstitutional. Camden County Superior Court Judge Paul A. Lowengrub had ruled in July 1989 that the ordinance existed "only to protect the established business community in the borough" and not "to permissibly regulate peddling" along Kings Highway.

CHICAGO - Best Buy Co. Inc. plans to add a dozen vending kiosks inside major airports across the country as part of a new pilot program called "Best Buy Express," company executives said. The nation's largest consumer electronics retailer is partnering with ZoomSystems, a San Francisco-based vending machine company, for the project that will install the small automated stores at eight airports. The machines will stock cell phone and computer accessories, along with digital cameras, portable data storage devices, headphones, travel adapters, electronic chargers and other gadgets.

John J. O'Neill, 69, a retired vending and food services company manager, died Wednesday at his Plymouth Meeting home. He had suffered a stroke a few years ago. In 1995, he retired as a general manager for ARA Services Inc. and its successor, Aramark Corp., a food vending and food management company, where he had been employed for 35 years. Previously, he worked for 16 years at Imhoff's restaurant in Philadelphia's Germantown section, where he became a manager. Mr. O'Neill was a member of the Pennsylvania Automatic Merchandising Council.

IT IS disappointing that even when the Daily News acknowledges that the prime contract for vending rights with Festival Food Management for Live 8 was awarded as part of a competitive process, the headline still reads "Milton Street Got Part of No-Bid Live 8 Contract. " In the days leading up to the July Fourth weekend, city lawyers negotiating the contract with Live 8 producers reserved the right to sell vending rights and partially offset city costs. Given time constraints and the need to have an experienced prime vendor managing up to 250 locations on the Parkway, the city sought and received written proposals from Festival Food, which has years of experience in handling the Sunoco Welcome America!

Students at Shippensburg University can get the "morning-after" pill by sliding $25 into a vending machine, an idea that has drawn the attention of federal authorities and raised questions about how accessible emergency contraception should be. The student health center at Shippensburg, a secluded Pennsylvania public institution of 8,300 students tucked between mountain ridges in the Cumberland Valley, provides the Plan B One Step emergency contraceptive in...

Students at Shippensburg University in Pennsylvania can get the "morning-after" pill by sliding $25 into a vending machine, an idea that has drawn the attention of federal regulators and raised questions about how accessible emergency contraception should be. The student health center at Shippensburg, a public institution of 8,300 students tucked between mountain ridges in the Cumberland Valley, provides the Plan B One Step emergency contraceptive in...

The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board's one-year experiment with wine-vending machines at grocery stores is over, at least for now, because of a financial dispute with the contractor, LCB officials said yesterday. Monday was the last day to resolve the dispute with contractor Simple Brands LLC and keep the machines operating, and liquor board CEO Joe Conti said he couldn't foresee the program being revived. The liquor board maintains that Simple Brands owes the state about $1 million, but Simple Brands has disputed that assessment, saying the liquor board had incurred unnecessary expenses and "improperly" billed the company.

HARRISBURG - Pennsylvania's wine kiosk era quietly went off-line Tuesday morning. That is when officials from the state Liquor Control Board made the last call to pull the plug on the remaining 21 wine vending machines in supermarkets scattered across the state. The reason: a dispute over money with Simple Brands L.L.C., the Conshohocken company that owns the machines. The LCB contends that Simple Brands owes nearly $1 million for expenses incurred setting up the kiosk program.

Ed Fischer used to buy two 20-ounce bottles of Coke a day from the machine near his 7th-floor City Hall office. He still buys two Cokes a day - but now the city limits sugar-sweetened beverages to 12 ounces. Here's how the difference potentially adds up: Bottles: 240 calories x 2 (bottles per day) x 5 (days per week) = 2,400 calories a week. Cans: 140 calories x 2 (cans per day) x 5 (days per week) = 1,400 calories a week. As a general rule, 3,500 calories equals one pound of body weight.

A new breed of food truck is giving the ubiquitous cheesesteak a run for its money as the city's preferred curbside delight. The inaugural Philadelphia Vendy awards, a culinary showdown among eight of the city's elite mobile food vendors held Saturday in Northern Liberties, sought to identify and reward the leaders of that breed. And nary a steak was in sight. "It's been a long hard day, but it's been a beautiful day," Thomas Bacon, also known as Gigi, of Gigi and Big R Caribbean/American Soul Food, the crowned victor of the event, said as he clutched a gleaming trophy cup. "The Vendy Cup is a trophy that I can drink cool beer out of - after standing over a deep fryer, frying chicken, cooking cabbage and greens, and serving the customers.

USA Technologies Inc., of Malvern, said it expects its revenues to reach $7 million for its fourth quarter, ending June 30. The company specializes in wireless, cashless transactions, providing noncash systems in vending, commercial laundry, hospitality and digital imaging industries. Last year it had fourth-quarter revenues of $4.48 million.    - Jane M. Von Bergen

It's been noted that Pennsylvania's Soviet-style ministry of alcohol might be headed the way of the U.S.S.R. for a few reasons. The incoming governor and state House majority leader (not to mention most of the state's humans) are avowed detractors of ye olde Liquor Control Board. And a $4 billion budget deficit should have Harrisburg reconsidering nonessential functions, as well as such nonessential malfunctions as the booze bureaucracy. But the most compelling case for eliminating the LCB has been advanced by the LCB itself.

HARRISBURG - Talks with retailers are delaying the deployment of kiosks that will allow Pennsylvanians to buy wine without going to state liquor stores. Liquor Control Board spokeswoman Stacey Witalec told WITF-FM that negotiations with supermarkets and routine safety testing were pushing back the planned rollout of the wine vending machines. The board had hoped to have more kiosks deployed by late August, including some in the Philadelphia area. Two Harrisburg-area machines were deemed a success after they were unveiled in June.

WHEN Department of Licenses & Inspections enforcers busted the Buttercream Cupcake Lady's truck last week in University City, it sent shock waves through the cutting-edge gaggle of rolling gourmet-food vendors that roam Philadelphia, broadcasting their locations via Twitter, vending for a couple of hours and moving on. Philadelphia is a newcomer to the drive-by dining fad that has so overwhelmed New York City streets that there's a freeze on...