LOS ANGELES — For close to a decade, Josefina Lopez has been selling chips, sodas and popsicles on the streets of L.A. It’s what sustains her family:

“I make money here. It’s not a lot, but its daily, with it I have enough to feed my kids,” said Lopez.

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But street vending has been illegal in L.A. for decades, so the police have confiscated her merchandise four times. It deeply affected her kids, especially her daughter who for years was scared her mother would be taken away by immigration officials.

“We would come to sell and she would hug me when she would see an officer, because she was scared for a long time. She would scream and grab my leg and say 'Mom, mom, I don’t want them to take you,'” said Lopez.

But this year, change is on the horizon. In November of 2018 after 10 years of lobbying by street vendors, the City of L.A. adopted an ordinance legalizing and regulating street vending. 

Josefina was there the moment the city voted, and celebrated the decision that would affect her and 50,000 other vendors.

So when 2020 started and the regulation processed opened up, Lopez was one of the first in line at City Hall trying to get her vending permit.

“It means a lot to me, because it’s been a struggle. Now with this permit, they’re not going to bother me, I’ll be able to sell without fear,” said Lopez.

Three permits are required for merchandise vendors, four for food vendors. The permits cost $291 until the end of June, when they’ll go up to $541.

For Lopez who sells about $80 a day, and after paying for merchandise takes home only about half of that, the fees represent weeks of work.

In her quest for the permit, she went to City Hall, the Department of Public Works, the Bureau of Street Services, and the library, where she has to fill out a digital form, this time with the state.

The permits prohibit vending in certain areas of the city like the Staples Center, Dodger’s Stadium and the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

But some brick and mortars are worried that they do not have a say on whether street vending happens in front of their stores.

“They should have a proper space to be sold at, not outside our stores or anyone’s stores” said Sinampreet Kaur, who has been working at the AA Liquor Market in Venice for almost a year.

She says street vending affects their bottom line.

“What happens is our sales goes down, it really impacts our sales like people just sell it for a cheaper price and people just go there to buy their stuff from there and ignore our store completely,” said Kaur.

They would like to compete with the street vendors she says, especially on the chips where they are most affected, but they have to pay for rent, electricity, trash and insurance.

She also says the street vendors cut down on the foot traffic to their store.

Back at the library, Lopez has had to stop the permitting process.

“It’s asking me for my tax ID number, I don’t have it and now I have to go see where to get it in order to get my permit,” said Lopez.

As an undocumented immigrant without a tax ID number she doesn’t have the forms required to fill out the rest of her permits. 

“I feel discouraged,” she says. 

But she’ll keep trying she says. After all, her and her kids have been waiting a decade for this change, that will bring her business out of the shadows.