Food trucks OK'dfor special events
Regulations for food trucks to operate on public property only during special events gained approval from the North Little Rock City Council last week, and more legislation is planned to expand the allowable locations.
"We're coming back [July 28] to address private property," Mayor Joe Smith told the City Council, adding that the food trucks would still be restricted to special events approved by the mayor's office.
A city permit good for a maximum of three days will be required for all mobile vendors, except for catered events.
The Mobile Food Vendor ordinance passed the council 7-0 Monday, with Alderman Bruce Foutch absent.
North Little Rock's municipal code previously didn't address any allowances for food trucks to prepare and sell food or beverages within the city.
"What we're looking at is an amendment to the zoning ordinance so food vendors could be on private property without having to go to the Planning Commission" to request a special use permit, Deputy City Attorney Matt Fleming said.
Billings to directspecial projects
Jim Billings, who formerly oversaw North Little Rock's government access cable channel, will begin Aug. 1 as the city's special projects director, Mayor Joe Smith announced.
Billings worked at Russellville High School for the past two years and is now retired from teaching, a city spokesman said. Prior to that, Billings directed NLRTV-Ch. 4, a joint project between the city and the North Little Rock School District that is produced from a studio at North Little Rock High School, West Campus.
Billings' annual salary will be $36,000, Smith said.
State Rep. Eddie Armstrong, D-North Little Rock, was the city's previous special projects director, but resigned a year ago to concentrate on his duties in the Legislature.
Library to be stopfor alcohol exhibit
William F. Laman Library in North Little Rock will be a stop in 2015 for the exhibition Spirited: Prohibition in America as part of a five-year, North American tour that began in June, the National Constitution Center announced.
Laman Library, at 28th and Orange streets, is scheduled to have the exhibit June 16-Aug. 11, 2015, the sixth stop for the exhibition that will also make stops at two dozen other libraries, museums, universities and other venues in the United States and Canada through mid-2019, according to a Constitution Center news release.
The 2,000-square foot adaptation of the center's world premiere exhibition, American Spirits: The Rise and Fall of Prohibition, explores the history of Prohibition, from the start of the temperance movement to the unprecedented repeal of a constitutional amendment in 1933. The exhibit examines topics such as the role of liquor in American culture, the cultural revolution of the Roaring '20s and how today's alcohol laws vary from state to state.
The new exhibition has been adapted for touring by the Mid-America Arts Alliance. It is sponsored by NEH on the Road, a special initiative by the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Metro on 07/20/2014