NEDERLAND, Texas — The City of Nederland has put out a call for those interested in being on a committee to look at the city's rules for food trucks.
Currently food truck operators need a special permit to set up and serve food. Those permits are currently only issued for special events and the food trucks can only set up at businesses that have invited them and will allow them to set up on their property.
The committee will consist of 10 members including the city manager, chief building official, two council members plus six others according to a Facebook post Wednesday afternoon on the city's Facebook page.
The city prefers to fill the other six spots with two food truck operators, two restaurant operators and two interested Nederland residents according to the post.
Those who are interested in serving on the committee must submit a "boards and commissions statement and application" by the end of the business day on Friday, September 1, 2023, the post said.
The committee members will work on making recommendations to amend the city's existing food truck regulations according to Nederland City Manager Chris Duque.
"We're trying to be open about this process. I think their are a lot of sides to the discussion and we want to get that input," said Duque.
Food truck owners are hoping this will make serving food in their hometown easier.
"This committee is going to to sit down and have a more formal conversation with the restaurant owners, citizens of Nederland and the food truck owners to just see where everybody's coming from," said Keith Bass, owner of The Dude's Foods food truck.
"It's hard to make anything to stay in business, much less with competition from people that aren't paying what I pay," Bryan told 12News previously.
"The reason why we bought this back up is because we wanted to lift the special events clause that's in there," said Bass.
City Manager Chris Duque told 12News that right now food trucks can only serve at businesses where they've been invited.
"We define that as the event organized and permitted by the business establishment for promotion or advertisement, in which the setup is completely on private property," said Duque.
The city will be selecting members based on the applications that can be submitted in person, by fax at (409) 723-1550, or via email to city clerk Joni Underwood at JUnderwood@ci.nederland.tx.us.