Mission Street vendor ban set to go into effect Monday

Stephanie Lin
·2 min read

SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) – More than 100 San Francisco Mission Street vendors are continuing to push back on a proposed city ban on business.

“For many folks, it’s their only livelihood, their only way to make a living due to immigration status and the barriers and challenges that come with that,” said Kevin Ortiz, co-president of the SF Latinx Democratic Club.

This week’s demonstration is a desperate plea from families, supporters say, who are legally permitted to sell products on Mission Street and have done so for years in one of the most expensive cities in the country.

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“Many families I’ve talked to are stressed, they are worried,” Ortiz said.

The group is calling for the city to delay its plans until after the busy holiday season, but ban supporters say the plazas near the 16th and 24th Street BART stations are now hotspots for crime – places where stolen goods are sold, and public works employees are assaulted for trying to enforce the law.

Supervisor Hilary Ronen represents the district. She says, “After evaluating neighborhood health and safety records, city leaders found vending on Mission Street and around BART stations are creating measurable hazards in the neighborhood.”

“Enforcing a ban on folks that did things the right way and did the right process does nothing to actually stop any illegal activity,” Ortiz said.

Vendor advocates acknowledge area crime but say that punishing those following the rules is not the solution.

“We want to keep our city workers safe, but there haven’t been social workers, case managers on those plazas,” Ortiz said.

Supervisor Ronen says her office is looking for spaces off public sidewalks to “mitigate the harm to innocent street vendors who sell their goods to make a living,” adding she is increasing resources to local workforce development programs supporting the legal street vending community.

As of Thursday, the city’s 90-day ban on street vending goes into effect on Monday. From there, the situation on Mission Street will be re-evaluated to see whether that ban should remain in place. Ortiz wants the ban pushed back past Jan. 1, so vendors can continue to sell through the holidays.

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