The Madison Vending Oversight Committee approved a proposal to improve football gameday vending regulations for safety purposes Wednesday.
Committee members essentially formalized the current Southeast Campus Vending Area ordinance, agreeing to make vending policy stricter on Badger football Saturdays to enhance public safety and relieve congestion, particularly on Regent Street.
""We are simply formalizing and institutionalizing what has existed for years,"" committee member Warren Hansen said.
Hansen will consider the locations for vendors and said the improved ordinance would make vending policy ""more official.""
""Now vendors have a site they can depend on going to every single gameday,"" Hansen said.
He said the ordinance would not displace many of the vendors who have been regularly cooperative on football Saturdays.
Hansen said he intends to place most vendors where they have traditionally been, but has also adjusted the location of some vendors violating city laws, such as those who set up too close to a fire hydrant.
Also, southeast campus area vendors would not have to pay the $475 fee that is required for other vendors to obtain a site on a football Saturday.
In the future, Hansen said he hopes there will be more basic street vendors along Regent Street because the committee has created stencils for 57 different sites.
The south border of the southeast campus vending area begins at West Washington Street and stretches to the Breese Terrace, including a block or two of Monroe Street. The ending property line is on the sidewalk on the south side of Regent Street.
