Tacos Are Victorious!

We have reportedly previously on the LA taco truck controversy.  The Los Angeles Times reports that a Los Angeles Superior Court judge invalidated a controversial ordinance passed in April by county supervisors that made it a misdemeanor in unincorporated parts of the county to park a taco truck in one spot for more than an hour. The ordinance, Judge Dennis A. Aichroth ruled, was unconstitutionally vague in its description of how quickly a vendor could return to an area where the truck was previously parked. Aichroth said it also violated the vehicle code because county supervisors had not properly established that it was written in the interest of public safety.

A spokeswoman for Supervisor Gloria Molina, the ordinance’s author, said the fight was not over. “We knew from the start,” spokeswoman Roxanne Marquez said, “that this case would go to court. We will appeal and we expect to win.” Marquez rejected claims that the ordinance targeted small vendors in favor of bigger businesses and developers who make larger political donations. “We are coming down on the side of our residents who deserve a good quality of life,” she said.

The law was passed unanimously by supervisors after restaurateurs complained that taco trucks parking on the streets near their businesses were drawing away customers.  The LA taco truck ordinance sparked an outcry, which included an internet petition that collected more than thousands of signatures.  www.saveourtacotrucks.org.

Yesterday, we commented on the possibility that the new LPGA English only rule might be a way of discriminating by proxy against Korean golfers.  One might think that a taco truck ban might be a way of targeting persons of Mexican ancestry. In the taco truck case, however, it appears that persons of Mexican ancestry (Mexican restaurant owners) support an ordinance that might injure small business owners of Mexican ancestry.  Add politics to the mix and we have a very complex taco!

KJ