HUTTO – Downtown business representatives appeared before Hutto City Council on Nov. 16 to ask the city to reconsider some older ordinances they say are standing in the way of the historic downtown district living up to its potential.
“We have to turn people away,” Enrique Diaz said. “We’re asking you to let us open later than 8 (p.m.). We have a nice place, good lighting. We put up a lot of lights in the park and a lot of people come after 8.”
Diaz owns The Hippo Escape at 209 Farley St., which has been a food truck court for several years. Diaz bought the land earlier this year, made improvements including improved lighting and moved his own La Parilla LAC food truck onto the lot. Other trucks sharing the space include Kona’s TX BBQ and The Pastrami Guy.
Hutto has promoted downtown as a qualityof- life destination and holds various events designed to bring shoppers and visitors to the historic district, including the city’s holiday tree lighting ceremony. Business owners Joseph Cortez and Daniela Medellin, who own and operate the Hutto Farmers Market, have been partnering with The Hippo Escape to hold weekly Food Truck Friday events with live music and pop-up markets. Due to city ordinances the food service must end at 8 p.m.
“We see an influx of visitors coming to get food and they can’t serve them. Hutto is growing and a lot of people want to eat dinner after 8. It’s not such a small town anymore,” Cortez said.
Cortez believes that for mobile food trucks the restrictive ordinances might make sense, but that’s not the case with food trucks in downtown.
“They own the land, and they’re really not mobile so restricting what they can do on private property is not correct, especially considering the kind of permanent locations we have here. The city shouldn’t be running people’s business. We have our permits and do what we need as it should be,” he said.
Cortez added that for the most part, the city has been helpful with their business and has been hands-off, but there are just some older ordinances that should change.
Evan Porterfield, who owns Mary’s Mountain Cookies at 201 West St., appeared before City Council Nov. 16 representing the recently formed Downtown Hutto Business Association. Porterfield told council members that downtown business owners would like to have a place at the table when downtown events are discussed.
“Overall, as business owners we’ve maybe not so eloquently pointed out some of our concerns, for example regarding events in downtown. We’ve had scheduling conflicts and collaboration challenges. We’ve seen some policy changes in the city that have not been a benefit to our businesses. We’d like to have more of a voice in that,” Porterfield said. “We want to be more involved.”
Porterfield listed working with city staff, council, committees and the Chamber of Commerce to fine tune the needs of downtown.
Brian Burns, owner of Lamppost Coffee at 109 East St., points out that collaboration between the business association, the city and Chamber is necessary to prevent harm to downtown businesses.
“Mostly we’d like to work with the City Council and Chamber when they do events that take over the parking and sometimes it excludes our customers. They’ve had events where food trucks are in parked in front of my shop and the generators are on the sidewalk right in front of my door, making it hard for customers to get to me.
If we’re doing events in downtown, we need to see that we’re not harming the businesses that are there all the time,” Burns said.
For its part, the Chamber seems willing to listen. The Olde Tyme Days event held in October saw an updated layout that kept sidewalks clear so brick-and-mortar businesses could also benefit from the crowd of festivalgoers, according to Chamber President Tim Jordan.
Council directed city staff and the city attorney to look at some of the ordinances in question and bring a recommendation to a future council meeting.
The Hippo Escape, 209 Farley St. in Hutto, adds to the walkability factor of downtown but says it needs longer serving hours to play a bigger role in downtown nightlife. Photo by Edie Zuvanich
