On Monday, San Francisco’s temporary ban on Mission District street vendors went into effect.
That same day, just a little past the corner of 17th and Mission, a crowd gathered outside of 2135 Mission St. to watch a “danza de felicidades,” a traditional Aztec dance meant to welcome people to a new space.
Inside of the new space, yellow tape on the ground marked out 44 spots, where vendors can now sell goods. Alma Castellanos is the Director of Operations at Clecha, they’re an SF non-profit running the space at 2135 Mission St. She spent Monday morning helping vendors fill out their paperwork.
"So what we're doing now is we're giving them other paperwork, their contracts that they're signing of acceptance to want to sell in this space. And then we're going to assign them their number and they'll be able to start vending as of today," Castellanos said.
According to Castellanos, the space will be open from 10am to 6pm, seven days-a-week.
Rodrigo Lopez is a street vendor in San Francisco. Before the restrictions went into effect he normally set up outside of the 24th St. BART station, selling toys, baby clothes and tennis shoes. He applied for a spot at 2135 Mission St., but he’s worried about what the lack of foot traffic will do for his business.
"We believe we're going to be affected in a hard way. There's going to be a pinch in my pocket because it's going to be different. This is not gonna be the same," Lopez said.
While vendors filled out paperwork at 17th and Mission, a crowd of about 100 people gathered outside of the 24th St. BART station to protest the ban.
According to Supervisor Hillary Ronen, the ban was implemented to protect San Francisco Public Works employees, who say they received repeated threats after trying to crack down on illegal vending in the Mission District.
At 11:30 a.m. a few rogue vendors had already set up outside of the 16th St. BART station, but within minutes SFPD and Public Works Employees made them pack up their stuff and leave.
