Braves souvenir street vendors ask for court help

By Steve Visser

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Two street peddlers who sell Braves souvenirs on Wednesday asked a judge to prevent a corporation from evicting them from their vending sites around Turner Field.

Enlarge photo

Hyosub Shin Braves souvenirs vendor Larry Miller (right) is asking a judge to intervene and prevent a corporation from evicting him and other sellers from their vending sites around Turner Field.

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General Growth Properties, which also operates shopping malls, has a contract with the city to handle all street vending. City officials say they want the corporation have control of the city's 85 street vending locations, even deciding what goods a peddler can sell, to ensure certain standards.

The company would charge the vendors rent and sell advertising space on the outside of the souvenir stalls.

Vendors Larry Miller and Stanley Hambrick said that arrangement in effect makes them beholden to General Growth Properties rather than independent businessmen.

"I am not a sharecropper," said Miller, who currently pays only a $250 annual license fee.

Robert Frommer, a lawyer for the vendors, argued that the city contract was unconstitutional because the Georgia Constitution prohibits a city from promoting a monopoly.

The lawyer asked Superior Court Judge Shawn LaGrua to forestall the eviction of vendors whose city permits expire on Dec. 31 until she decides whether the contract is constitutional. A lawsuit was filed on behalf of the vendors by the Institute for Justice, a Libertarian public policy law firm based in Washington. LaGrua said she would rule in a few weeks.

Laura Burton, a city attorney, said the spirit of the contract clearly envisions multiple vendors, which would put General Growth Properties more in the role of a property manager or landlord.

"The city has the right to regulate vending," she said.