A full Queenstown Lakes District Council workshop, held in Wānaka yesterday, updated councillors on the next steps before a prohibition on pop-up stalls at the lakefront expires in April.
Council staff will seek direction from councillors on the future of trading on the lakefront on March 19.
Last year, councillors decided to ban pop-up stallholders from operating on the waterfront for 12 months and to stop issuing more permits for the activity following complaints and non-compliance under the Activities in Public Places Bylaw 2023.
Queenstown Lakes District deputy mayor Quentin Smith said during the meeting the issue was with stallholders’ compliance, not registration.
"We need drastic action," he said.
After the recent workshop, Arrowtown-Kawarau ward councillor Melissa White said
it possible the ban on pop-up stalls would continue, but that was not the intent.
"We are at a stage now where it is a big problem," she said.
"It is such an overcrowded area and we want to be supportive in trying to move forward.
"It’s quite complicated, but we need to think about the rules we’ve got and what that might look like in the future."
Council monitoring, enforcement and environmental manager Isabelle Logez presented the council briefing.
She said "congestion, accessibility and equity concerns" as well as damage to council infrastructure due to "fat, waste and oil residue" had prompted the ban.
Over the summer, council staff observed that despite the ban there was still blatant non-compliance, she said.
Some stallholders were operating without permission at all.
Ms Logez said traders were seen breaching a 50m spacing rule.
The duration of the prohibition, one year, was too limited to be of any value for the long-term enforcement of the bylaw, she said.
Councillors were told yesterday that staff were concerned not by the bylaw itself, but rather about monitoring and enforcement.
Meanwhile, a group of street food vendors are continuing with their legal challenge to the bylaw.
The Queenstown Lakes District Food Vendors Society and its chairwoman, Danna Burton, have successfully applied for a judicial review of the bylaw on the grounds it was adopted without lawful consultation.
A one-day hearing has been scheduled for April 16 in the High Court in Invercargill.
