Everett, MA Food Trucks & Mobile Vendors: Vending Zones (2026)

Section 12-203 is the provision in the Everett Revised Ordinances that draws a location boundary around vendors. Under subsection (a), the city council determines the designated area of each Special Event in the City of Everett. The area surrounds the Special Event area and is always indicated by a measurement in feet from it. Section 12-202 repeats the same limit, and subsection (d) of Section 12-203 requires a list of the exclusions, with area, dates and times, to be kept on file in the office of the City Clerk. A food seller who wants to know whether a corner is off limits on a given weekend checks that list.

Subsection (b) is blunt: no vendor, with or without a license or permit, except a vendor holding a special license from the city council, can present goods for sale within the designated area, measured from the property line of the special event location. Holding an ordinary Board of Health or police permit does not unlock the zone. A permanently established business inside the zone is exempt under subsection (c), but only for items normally presented for sale at its location.

Outside an event zone, a food vendor works through several separate rules. Section 12-41 bars anyone, other than a person licensed under M.G.L. Ch. 101 sec. 22, from going from place to place selling fruits, vegetables, meat, butter, cheese or fish from a cart, wagon or other vehicle without a license from the board of health. Section 12-43 lists Mobile Vendor at fifty dollars ($50.00) on that schedule, with licenses dating from and expiring on the first day of May. Section 12-22 bars crying wares in a public street and bars using a bell, horn or other noise-making instrument to announce a sale. Section 12-28 requires a written permit from the chief of police before occupying or using any part of a public way to sell any article, issued not more than seven (7) days before it takes effect. Section 8-15 lists Food Truck Inspections at $50.00 on the fire permit fee schedule.