On Tuesday, city council gave Tourism Kamloops the green light to use Riverside Park for commercial purposes.
During the afternoon meeting, council voted in support of opening up the park to allow local businesses to operate food trucks or provide equipment rentals this summer.
In summer 2021, council authorized Tourism Kamloops to coordinate and manage various commercial activities in Riverside Park, including sport and recreation equipment rentals, games, and food and beverage services.
Although summer 2021 was a quiet year, city staff say they have much more interest from local food trucks this year.
“The program really did inject a lot of life and energy into Riverside Park,” said Sean Smith, the city’s business operations and events supervisor.
“With the new spray park that just opened May Long weekend, we do expect it to attract many more users during the week and the weekends, it has proven that already. The service provided by Tourism Kamloops will provide additional activities and service for families to enhance the visitor’s experience.”
To renew the program for summer 2023, city council had to approve a temporary exemption to the Parks and Public Lands bylaw.
Council debated whether or not the one-year exemption was the right choice, which would allow a slower introduction of commercial uses in Riverside. They also considered a longer exemption, which might be more appealing to local businesses wanting to set up in the park.
Coun. Nancy Bepple thought the one-year exemption would suffice, but thought more engagement was needed with not only Tourism Kamloops and vendors, but the public as well to see if they liked the idea of commercial uses in the park.
On the other side of the argument, coun. Katie Neustaeter thought the pilot program in 2021 was successful and argued that the program could now run longer.
“It was kind of my understanding that we’ve already had a pilot. I think it was deemed to be successful and that was during a more challenging time, socially, then we’re in right now,” said coun. Neustaeter, saying the program should be in place for much longer.
“And we do hear a huge demand for more of those kinds of activities … I guess what I’m not quite connecting is what is our risk? What are we scared of? Do we think the city may have to shut it down after a year, because it's not being used enough?”
City staff said they had concerns about the lack of engagement in 2021, but were much more confident that this year to be different with the new spray park. They did say a review after a year would follow "best practices" to ensure the program was running successfully for all those involved.
Coun. Neustaeter said this kind of use of the city’s waterfront should have been in place a long time ago and thought the bylaw should be amended right away.
City council voted in favour of a two-year exemption to the bylaw, which will be reviewed after the first year.
Tourism Kamloops will be the prime contractor overseeing business in Riverside and will be required to acquire all the necessary insurance to cover the city, staff, third-party employees and the public.
