Yellowknife (July 30/03) - City council says they've heard the people loud and clear and are taking steps to get downtown street vendors back.

During a city council meeting an amendment to the current business licence bylaw was given first reading, setting the ball in motion to make changes and allow food vending downtown.

Coun. David McCann first questioned the 1990 bylaw, which prevents vendors who want to sell goods downtown from getting a business licence, during a committee meeting on Monday.

"I can't find a single person on the street that understands why this is happening," said McCann.

"This notion is dead counterproductive from a tourism point of view," he said.

One of the reasons vending isn't allowed downtown is because vendors could take away from other business, who pay property tax on their buildings, said Glenn Peterson, manager of city business licensing.

But Coun. Robert Hawkins said he's talked to several restaurant owners downtown who say they aren't threatened by street vendors.

"Let's do something about this, the community was shocked to hear food vending wasn't allowed," said Hawkins.

Council members said they first noticed this issue when an article in the Yellowknifer told the story of hot dog vendor Pat Papineau.

When Papineau tried to get a business licence to sell hot dogs downtown he found there was a bylaw against it.

"I think their biggest problem was that business owners were complaining about losing business to vendors," said Papineau. "And I think that's ridiculous."

In the July 9 Yellowknifer out of 18 people interviewed, 16 people said they didn't think vendors were a threat to downtown businesses at all and two people said the city should just limit the number of vendors allowed downtown, but not get rid of them completely.

In the July 16 Yellowknifer a phone poll showed out of 75 calls, 55 people voted yes they would like street vendors, four voted no and 16 others didn't register their vote.