Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station officials Friday confirmed they conducted an operation Thursday evening that focused on illegal street vending, which was an issue raised by Castaic residents during a recent meeting organized by L.A. County officials.
Thursday’s operation involved a citation on the other side of the SCV, Deputy Robert Jensen, a station spokesman, confirmed Friday.
Station officials did not have any details from the results of the operation available Friday afternoon, he said, but he confirmed that a video circulated on social media showed part of a multiagency operation involving the station’s Crime Prevention Unit in Canyon Country.
The station’s CPU was joined by L.A. County Public Works, L.A. County Public Health and the Tax Collectors’ Unit, among other agencies.
Castaic merchants, particularly those along the freeway corridor, brought numerous complaints to a county meeting intended to hear their concerns in March.
A number of retailers said the largely unlicensed merchants were putting them out of business by setting up mobile food vending operations in front of restaurant locations where they pay rent.
Station deputies who attended the meeting said that enforcement operations like the one conducted Thursday are their only real recourse until the laws change to provide for an enforcement mechanism “with some teeth.”
Frustrated county officials also said enforcement efforts tend to have very temporary impacts, if any at all, because of the way that the laws around street vending are written.
Vendors found afoul of the county’s codes typically reset their operation by the following day, if not hours later, according to officials.
