Cathedral City, CA Food Trucks & Mobile Vendors: Sidewalk & Mobile Vending (2026)

Chapter 5.98 of the Cathedral City Municipal Code governs sidewalk vending in Cathedral City, California. Section 5.98.040 requires a business license under Chapter 3.28, and § 5.98.050 requires a sidewalk vending permit on top of it. The permit application under § 5.98.060 asks for identification, the proposed general area of operation, whether the cart is stationary or mobile, a description of the food or merchandise, a seller's permit, a food handler course certificate and a health department permit for food-related vending where applicable. Permits expire one year after issuance and are not transferable. The Riverside County department of environmental health is the health department, and carts selling food must comply with the California Retail Food Code.

Section 5.98.120 is the core list of prohibitions: no stationary cart in a residential zone, no vending in street center medians, no soliciting persons in motor vehicles, no use of marked parking spaces, drive aisles, landscaped areas or planters in a public parking lot, no sales of alcoholic beverages, cannabis, tobacco, weapons, fireworks or contraband, no offering a service, and no vending within picnic shelters or similar park amenities.

Operating rules sit in § 5.98.110. In non-residential areas vendors operate between seven a.m. and dusk, except in commercial zones where businesses are open later. Vendors keep a clean and trash-free ten-foot radius around a stationary cart, food vendors provide a customer trash receptacle, and no waste can be discharged into the gutter, street or storm drain. Under § 5.98.130 a cart cannot sit within twenty feet of a marked crosswalk, fire hydrant or driveway, within twenty-five feet of a transit stop, or within fifty feet of a public or private school, and must leave four feet of clear pedestrian space. Section 5.98.140 bars vending within three hundred feet of a permitted event while it operates.