Banned Art

An unexpected L&I crackdown leaves First Friday street vendors on the outs.

by Tom Namako

At odds

Lauren Nash L& WHY NOW?: Amanda and Keith Morton spent $500 on business permits, yet the city still rousted them from their First Friday street booth. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

When Chen Reichert set up her street-side stand during First Friday about two weeks ago, she did things a bit differently than usual. She brought a smaller table so her artwork was always at arm's length. Then she laid a blanket on the table, and placed her work — postcards with small, boxy robots painted onto them — on top of the cover, so she could bundle everything up in a moment's notice.

"I made sure I could get out of there if I had to, and made sure all my stuff would be with me," she recalls.

Why the need for a quick escape? The dozens of vendors who set up on Second Street between Market and Arch have been around almost as long as First Friday itself, which began in 1991. The artists hope to boost name recognition and make a few bucks, while their customers come looking for an alternative to the gallery paintings with three-figure price tags. "It's one of the most popular things about First Friday," Reichert says.

The city, though, doesn't seem to want them there at all. Over the past two months, officials from the Department of Licenses and Inspections told the street vendors that if they don't pack up their things and move on, their work would be confiscated. Five vendors interviewed for this article say it represents the first time in years they've been threatened by the city. "I've been going to First Friday my whole life and just started selling there, and all of the sudden they're shutting people down?" Reichert says. "The whole thing seemed so random."

Hence her quick-escape blanket.

She had to use it on Oct. 5, when two women — one identified herself as an L&I business compliance enforcement officer and the other wouldn't give her name — walked down Second Street warning people that their wares would be carried away if they didn't pack up and leave. The first woman was giving out an official L&I business card with the name Charlene Jones.

"She said I needed a license to sell there," Reichert says. "I stalled for time and asked, 'Oh really? I didn't know that,' as I packed my stuff up fast."

A few minutes later, Reichert asked the unidentified woman where to get a license. There are none for Center City, she was told. "Then why are you telling us to get a permit?" she asked. She didn't get an answer.

Along the way, the officer also shut down Louie La Palombara's Geek Boy Press stand, where he sells digital and hand-drawn cartoon characters, and Brian Johnson's display table outside the new comic book store where he works, Brave New Worlds.

"I had everything set up when a lady with a badge told me to clear out or she was calling the cops," La Palombara says. "She didn't give an explanation, she just got all pissy. Then another lady comes over, and she said I was taking too much time. She was very combative, trying to get under my skin. She said they were complying with some weird rule."

The officer then made her way across from the Arden Theatre, where Amanda and Keith Morton have set up their table for nearly three years. The couple cuts, bends and blasts metal into different shapes, later painting in cartoon characters, political statements and the faces of vintage celebrities. They were a bit more prepared, though. Amanda pulled out a square orange placard with large, white block lettering that read, "License Tag" for the business Morton Art Emporium.

"We'd heard about L&I suddenly cracking down over the past month or two, so we went to the city and bought a business license and vending permit," Amanda later said in her Passyunk Avenue home. "We wanted to be legit."

So, they paid a $250 flat fee for the first license under the name Morton Art Emporium and $250 a year for the vendor permit. Yet even that wasn't good enough: The officer said they still couldn't be there. The Mortons pointed out that none of the banned vending spots on Second Street applied to them, and handed the officer their copy. They said she looked at the list, put it back down and said they still had to leave. Both groups got loud — Keith was yelling, "You can't do this" — and the officer threatened to call the police. Instead of hanging around, the Mortons packed up and left.

According to a document L&I distributes to permitted street vendors, selling goods is prohibited between Bainbridge and Vine streets, from the Delaware to the Schuylkill. The document is 14 pages long, and lists hundreds of streets alphabetically — except Center City, which it clusters within the "C" streets.

So if it's clearly against the city's rules, the vendors want to know, why is the crackdown starting now, after they've set up their stands for years? Everyone seems to have a theory.

La Palombara says new nearby condominium owners don't want people selling street-side. Reichert thinks it's L&I's payback for losing the outdoor-musicians battle in Rittenhouse Square [Cover, "Are These Guys Bothering You?" Will Dean, June 21, 2007]. The Mortons say that shop owners along Second Street could be annoyed with people setting up tables near their storefronts.

"Besides the fact that they're not supposed to be there, I can't answer that and I don't know," responds L&I spokeswoman Gayle Johns. When asked if a business compliance department supervisor could explain, she says none are available. Johns also says that if any artwork was confiscated, it would likely be returned to the owner.

"If that happened, they would be given a hearing to get their merchandise back," she says. "Usually the owner gets stuff back as long as it's not illegal to sell, like bootleg CDs and DVDs."

Three messages left for L&I Commissioner Bob Solvibile went unreturned, and Johns had no comment on the seemingly arbitrary enforcement actions. It's not a new criticism of the department, and it's recently drawn the attention of City Council — again.

On Tuesday, Councilman Daniel Savage held informational hearings about improving L&I; one of the topics was to examine why some locations suffer from enforcement actions while similar sites go untouched.

"It's a staffing issue," Savage says. "Ten years ago, I tried to get small-business permits myself, and the whole process is cumbersome. That still exists today."

Although the First Friday vendors fall into Councilman Frank DiCicco's district, he says he hasn't heard any complaints about the incidents.

In the meantime, Reichert is searching for an artist-friendly locale, and the Mortons are deciding what to do with $500 of useless permits. A recent trip to the business compliance department of L&I produced little results.

"They told us, 'Sometimes these laws are on the books for years and they didn't get any attention,'" Amanda says.

"They were happy to take our $500 at first," Keith said. "And then they tell us later that we can't use it."

(tom.namako@citypaper.net)