City leaders: No outdoor vendors for Fresno’s August ArtHop

Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias and the Downtown Fresno Partnership held a press conference Friday to announce that the city will restrict all outdoor permitted and non-permitted vendors from the Downtown ArtHop event scheduled Aug. 1 due to the ongoing heatwave.

“We know that the heat’s going to continue and we know that crowds are getting bigger and bigger and we have the responsibility to get ahead of any potential health and safety concerns,” Arias said. “We’re announcing today that the upcoming ArtHop on Thursday, Aug. 1 will not feature any permitted or un-permitted outdoor events, vending or entertainment.”

The announcement, made alongside Downtown Fresno Partnership CEO Elliot Balch, quickly turned into a back-and-forth between Arias and attendees, many of whom were there in support of local vendors , with several openly criticizing Arias’ and the city’s decision to impose the sanction on vendors without their input.

Arias went on to encourage the public to attend ArtHop on Aug. 1, which will now consist of exclusively indoor art galleries and a limited number of vendors who will be assigned limited indoor vendor space on a first-come-first-serve basis.

Arias added that, at this time, the cancellation of outdoor events will only apply to the ArtHop scheduled on Aug. 1.

Additionally, Arias said the City of Fresno and Downtown Fresno Partnership will soon work together to consider ArtHop’s current operational status.

“Some folks underestimate the amount of work that it takes to have this kind of event,” Arias added. “It includes county services; it includes state services like ABC (Alcoholic Beverage Control)…the County Health Department is here to make sure that the vendors are licensed and the food is safe. Police, of course, are here to ensure that folks are safe – it includes quite a bit of public resources to pull off an event that’s safe and secure for everyone.”

Arias also made note of $10 million in grants for arts and cultural organizations in Fresno from Measure P. With that additional support, Arias anticipates that ArtHop will continue to expand its footprint, drawing in more artists and galleries.

“Seeing the work of Downtown kind of evolve over 20 years I find myself sometimes having to remind folks how things were ten years ago,” said Balch. “It would have been beyond most of our wild dreams, at that point, to imagine that on ArtHop nights there would be 15,000 people…actually on this street during the average ArtHop.”

Arias added that in the next few weeks the City, Partnership and other entities will discuss how they will work together to continue to make ArtHop viable for both permitted and unpermitted vendors.

For some in attendance, however, Arias’ announcement seemed to strike a nerve, with several in attendance verbally voicing their displeasure with the announcement, expressing concern that by converting ArtHop into a permitted event, many vendors will be locked out of participating due to limited space or limited finances needed to acquire permitting.

Mike Oz, president of Fresno Street Eats, said that the potential of turning ArtHop into an exclusively permitted event could hurt a lot of local small businesses, many of which enjoy their biggest sale days of the month on the first Thursday of each month – the day ArtHop takes place.

“I’m generally supportive of the idea that ArtHop needs some cleanup and some fixing,” Oz said. “I’m unclear on whether or not this is the right method.”

Oz said that the city’s dream of a thriving Downtown Fresno region creates a Catch 22, in which the city has achieved its goal of driving people downtown, only to limit those numbers by potentially shrinking ArtHop by creating a vendor-by-permit system.

“You can’t want it and then not know what to do with it,” he said. “While this is happening right now, this conversation has been going on for two years; I’ve come and done this in private rooms for a couple years now…I hope for a positive outcome for it, but I don’t want to have this turn into a thing where [people are saying] ‘Oh, Downtown Fresno is unsafe.’”

Oz said that the city has come so far to overcome that stigma, returning to it would be detrimental to the development of a still-rebounding Downtown Fresno.

Despite ongoing uncertainty regarding the potential for future permit requirements, one thing is certain – August’s ArtHop will appear a bit different to attendees, all of whom Arias, Balch and Oz encourage residents and guests to attend.

Code enforcement will be present starting at 7:30 a.m. on Aug. 1 to inform prospective vendors of the policy with Arias adding that fines will be issued to vendors refusing to comply. Additionally, the City of Fresno will continue to share updates regarding this and future ArtHop events through social and mainstream media outlets.