San Marcos, CA Soliciting & Door-to-Door: Solicitor Permits (2026)

20, Article I of the San Marcos Municipal Code defines "Solicitor" to include peddlers, hawkers, transient dealers, salespersons and other itinerant vendors who go door to door or set up a temporary stand to sell goods, take orders, or distribute redeemable coupons or handbills (Sec. 010(k)). Sec. 00 to renew it; the ID card is free to anyone who has already paid the license fee, and all fees are nonrefundable and intended only to defray investigation and enforcement costs, not to raise revenue. Applicants must submit fingerprints, three photographs, a physical description, both local and permanent addresses, a description of the business and goods or services offered, and a statement of all misdemeanor and felony convictions (Sec.

040); the Issuing Officer forwards fingerprints to the California Bureau of Identification and must approve or deny the application within 30 days. A license or identification card can be denied, suspended or revoked for a conviction involving a business-regulation statute, a Penal Code Section 290 sex-offense registration requirement, any crime showing unfitness to solicit, a prior violation of this chapter, or a false statement on the application (Sec. 050). While soliciting, the licensee must display the identification card visibly on the front of the body and produce it on demand by any peace officer (Sec.

090). Students engaged in school-sponsored activities, wholesalers calling on retailers, farmers or ranchers selling their own produce, and newspapers and their employees are exempt from the chapter entirely (Sec. 070), and honorably discharged veterans and out-of-state interstate-commerce agents are exempt from the fees, though not from the application requirements (Sec. 080).