A crackdown on unpermitted street vendors at a busy Salinas corner also stops legal sales.

The parking lot of the Foods Co. shopping center on East Alisal and Sanborn streets in Salinas may be the closest thing the area has to a zócalo, a public square where people gather, purchase pan dulce or flowers, and talk.

It’s been so for years, says Chepe, a Salinas resident who edits the popular Twitter account and companion Tumblr site “Think Mexican,” which has a mission of connecting the Mexican community through news, history and culture.

“It’s the center of the community,” says Chepe, who goes by that single name. “It’s always been a place for street commerce to take place.”

But over the past month, there’s been a shift. Ladies selling bread and tamales have disappeared. The fruit and flower vendors now camp out on the sidewalk along Alisal Street and park their vehicles in the neighborhood rather than in the Foods Co. parking lot.

And if they step foot in that parking lot, they say, security calls the police.

“For two years, we were getting no problems from the police,” says Moises Gonzales, a 33-year-old fruit vendor who has a permit from the city allowing him to sell on public property. “Now in the last month, the city and police, they come one or two times a day and point out where the property line is. I know what the rules are and I’m not doing anything illegal.”

Gonzales plays a nearly five-minute cell phone video he recorded of an encounter with Salinas Assistant Police Chief Manny Martinez, who came out on a call from a Foods Co. manager on a report of trespassing. In the video, Martinez tells him if private security calls to report vendors are trespassing onto the Foods Co. parking lot, police will come out and cite them.

The vendors, even those with permits, feel harassed by Foods Co. management. But the harassment started elsewhere, when residents and business owners in the neighborhood began calling the city to complain that Foods Co. was permitting unlicensed vendors to operate in the parking lot.

“We started receiving complaints from the neighborhood about people doing dent repair in the parking lot, selling jewelry and cars and complaints of people getting harassed while they’re going to the bank,” says Lorenzo Sanchez, code enforcement manager for the city of Salinas. Foods Co. and the property owner were cited twice last month – first on Sept. 10 for $100, then on Sept. 30 for $500.

According to Sanchez, no street vendors have been cited by his office, at least not yet. “It got a little abusive when they thought they had the right to be there, but we’re trying to work with them and get their compliance.”

The vendors are allowed to be anywhere on a public right of way, including the sidewalks along Alisal Street, and aren’t required to move after a certain amount of time.

On the sidewalk, flower saleswoman Maria-Elena Lira says she can earn $400 to $500 on a busy day selling cut flowers, although on a recent Monday afternoon, sales had only amounted to about $50. As Día de los Muertos nears, flower sales will increase as people create altars and decorate gravestones for their deceased loved ones.

“They’re always out here checking on us and making sure we’re not breaking the rules,” Lira says. “I would like them to leave us in peace and let us work. Let us be free to do our work.”