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Residents press for tighter enforcement of roadside vendors after crash; county says most vendors were permitted
Summary
Speakers at the Nuevo Municipal Advisory Council warned that roadside vendors are creating public-safety hazards after a resident said his car was totaled; county code enforcement said most vendors observed during a Mother's Day operation had permits, and staff discussed enforcement limits and possible policy changes.
At a May meeting of the Nuevo Municipal Advisory Council, residents urged stronger enforcement of roadside vending after Marshall Lot described a May 10 crash he blamed on vehicles stopping to buy goods from roadside vendors.
"The insurance inspector conferred my car was total a total loss," Lot said, recounting that the driver who attempted a U‑turn struck his vehicle and that multiple shoppers stopped on Nuevo Road and Meny Road created unsafe conditions.
The issue drew sustained attention from staff and residents. Anna Ringel, Supervising Code Enforcement Officer, said county teams ran a Mother's Day vending operation from May 7–10 and found that "the majority of our vendors did have sidewalk vending permits. The two that did not were issued citations and or removed." Ringel and operations manager Shane Sanderson answered residents' questions about permit boundaries and prohibited zones, including the county's 500‑foot prohibitions around some thoroughfares.
Sanderson said the county must often reconcile ordinance distances with local conditions — for example, the 40‑foot/500‑foot measurements can be complicated in areas without sidewalks or where vendors use private property. He said visual markers and stepped enforcement are options the county can explore but warned that vendors are transient: "They just parked themselves 505 ft away from the space where they're not supposed to be."
Deputy Porter of the Riverside County Sheriff's Office described enforcement constraints in rural terrain and repeated that responses prioritize life‑safety calls. He also described tools deputies use for enforcement operations, including unmarked 'stealth' vehicles and aerial assets when available: "We do have drone assets that our partners have inside of the vehicles that we can get up high and even if we're not obviously we like to stop that in the in the act and saying we can arrest you for that."
Several speakers urged the MAC to take precautionary steps before allowing a July presentation by an outside developer (identified by a commenter as "Richland"), including asking for in‑person testimony only, limiting presentation time, and scheduling the developer for a later meeting when more neighbors could attend.
What happens next: Code enforcement said it will continue Thursday–Sunday patrols in the area and encouraged residents to use the county complaint channels and the informational vending flyer distributed at the meeting. MAC members and community volunteers discussed meeting between sessions at the local library to coordinate further outreach and to consider policy adjustments.
Provenance: County staff reports and resident comments at the May MAC meeting. This article draws on public comment from Marshall Lot and Greg Morris and remarks by Anna Ringel, Shane Sanderson, and Deputy Porter.
