Parksley Food Truck Ban Letter

Food trucks are great for communities. They help create jobs, improve public safety, revitalize underused public spaces, and generate sales taxes and permit fee revenue for municipalities. Yet, localities like Parksley, Virginia continue to restrict, or even ban, vendors and their food trucks from operating in their jurisdictions.

Parksley’s Town Council passed an ordinance banning food trucks from operating within town limits on a permanent basis. The law only allows food trucks to operate in Parksley during festivals or other special events, and vendors must pay a $30 permit fee for each event they want to attend. Otherwise, food trucks are prohibited.

IJ has established through more than a decade of research that food trucks positively impact local economies. In two separate studies from 2011 and 2012, for instance, IJ found that food trucks can help create jobs, improve public safety, revitalize underused public spaces, and generate sales taxes and permit fee revenue for municipalities. Another IJ study concluded that growth in the number of food trucks often goes hand in hand with growth in the brick-and-mortar restaurant industry. 

More importantly, Parksley’s ban violates the constitutional rights of small business owners and harms the public safety and local economy of Virginia’s Eastern Shore. That’s why the Institute for Justice (IJ) sent a letter to town officials in Parksley calling on them to repeal a near-total ban on food trucks.