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Cato Institute supports operator’s challenge against Chicago food truck rules

February 22, 2018

The Cato Institute has joined the Illinois Food Truck Owners Association and National Food Truck Association on an amicus brief supporting a Chicago cupcake truck's appeal of an appellate court’s ruling that upholds Chicago's food truck restrictions.

The owner of a cupcake food truck who is fighting Chicago's food truck regulations has taken her case to the Illinois Supreme Court, according to The Chicago Tribune. 

The legal battle began after the city announced its food truck regulations in 2012. Laura Pekarik, owner of the Cupcakes for Courage food truck, filed a petition to the state Supreme Court late last week after an appellate court ruled in the city's favor in December.

Under the regulations, mobile food vendors cannot park within 200 feet of a brick-and-mortar restaurant's primary entrance. Chicago is the only one of the nation's 10 largest cities to have a proximity requirement for food trucks, according to the National Food Truck Association.

Attorneys Ilya Shapiro and Aaron Barnes argued in a blog on the Cato Institute website that the Illinois Supreme Court should hear this case as the city laws "overtly advantaging market competitors" and force merchants to forego Fourth Amendment protections.

The attorneys called the regulations a disgraceful abuse of power that is "repugnant to a free and open society."

There is little to prevent cities and states nationwide from enacting similar regulations to any other disfavored economic activity, the attorneys said.