CAPE ELIZABETH — The Cape Elizabeth Town Council approved a recommendation from the Fort Williams Park Committee to move expressive vendors at the park after safety concerns had arisen last year.
According to Cape Elizabeth’s rules and regulations on the matter, expressive vending “is defined to mean materials or objects created by the vendor with expressive content, such as newspapers, books, or writings, and visual art, such as paintings, prints, photography, and sculpture.”
Town Manager Matt Sturgis explained that expressive vendors exercise their first amendment right and have had an allocated spot at Fort Williams Park, which was previously near the center parking lot.
Because of safety concerns — Councilor Christopher Straw recalling someone who had fallen last year and broken their ankle — Sturgis explained that the Fort Williams Park Committee recommended moving expressive vendors farther north.
The new location will be about 30 feet away, removing vendors from the paths of walkers and cars turning out on the corner, said Sturgis.
“Last year there was some improvements at the park where we made a major infrastructure investment in the center parking lot — that would be construction of sidewalks, curing and installed the pavement along those lines,” he said. “Things have changed since the last time the policy was reviewed.”
Kathy Raftice, director of community services at Fort Williams Park, said that the move, approved on April 13, will prevent vendors from getting in the way of pedestrians.
“(The committee) discussed it and due to the fact we’re coming up with a master plan that may change this going forward, we voted to move them a little bit up on that peninsula so they’re away from the crosswalk and off the sidewalk, so people can still see them and utilize them (instead of) right on the sidewalks, which impedes people walking back and forth,” she said.
The issue is not about “curtailing freedom of speech,” said Straw, who also clarified later in the discussion that he wasn’t blaming safety concerns on the vendors.
“This is about safety issues,” he said. “I believe this is roughly around the area where someone fell and broke their ankle … This is temporary until the overall master plan hopefully addresses this in a very holistic way.”
Councilor Jamie Garvin requested that the Fort Williams Park Committee creates a more “specific, dedicated space” for expressive vendors in the updated master plan that the group is discussing.
Sturgis and Raftice said that the committee will address the issue in the master plan review.
“We are trying to find a way to be safe for visitors as well as those using the sidewalk as well as vendors, to be quite honest,” Sturgis said.
Fort Williams Park is now closed until May 1, a safety measure the town council approved earlier in the month in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Comments are not available on this story.
Send questions/comments to the editors.
