Brick to Allow Additional Food Truck Licensees to Operate in Town

The 2016 Food Trucks and Football event in Lavallette. (Photo: Shorebeat LLC)

Brick officials have introduced an ordinance that would allow for three additional food truck operators to be licensed in town.

The township’s peddling and soliciting ordinance has long limited the number of licensed food trucks to seven, however that would increase to 10 under the revision being considered.

Some Brick residents may recall the “hot dog truck wars” of the 1990s, when disputes over food truck licensing was a major issue, as trucks began to proliferate on the side of seemingly every major road through town. The trucks were often unsightly and sometimes parked in public rights-of-way and on state property. In the decades since, however, food trucks have become much more popular as they also have become decidedly more upscale and trendy, often offering unique food seen as a benefit rather than an eyesore.

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Brick’s proposed revisions to the ordinance will only increase the number of food trucks licensed to operate in the township – it will not allow the trucks to locate themselves on public property. In the most common scenario, a shopping center or other commercial property would lease space to a food truck and allow them to operate in a portion of their parking lot.

“We’ve had three people on the waiting list for some time, and they had been asking when they would have an opportunity to open in town,” said Business Administrator Joanne Bergin. “And also, the mobile food trucks are kind of a new wave, more trendy these days, so we thought it was a fair idea.”

Councilman Vincent Minicino said during last week’s township council meeting that the ordinance requires mobile food vendors to stay in a single place no longer than 12 hours at a time during any 24 hour period, and must obtain a permit from the township clerk’s office.

“These food trucks can only be parked where they have the owner’s permission and where they have the approval of the police department and zoning,” said Minicino.

The ordinance does not apply to food trucks permitted at special events such as Summerfest, nor those exempt from local ordinances through a statewide veterans’ licensing program.