Entrepreneurial kids have a safe place in New Jersey under a law signed by Gov. Phil Murphy on Nov. 8, welcoming lemonade stands and lawn-mowing businesses without municipal interruption.
Assembly Bill 853 is sponsored by Assembly members Nicholas Chiaravalloti, D-31st District; Robert Karabincha, D-18th District; Angela McKnight, D-31st District, and several others. Sister bill Senate Bill 797 – sponsored by state Sens. Sandra Cunningham, D-31st District, and Michael Doherty, R-32nd District – prohibits municipalities from requiring children get licensed to operate temporary businesses.
The bills were introduced in January 2020 and finally passed the Legislature in June 2021. An identical bill was introduced in 2018 and went nowhere.
Cunningham
“Whether kids are raising money for charity or saving up for something they want, lemonade stands are a sight we all enjoy to see within our neighborhoods,” Cunningham said when the bill passed assembly committee in October 2020. “Almost all of us have either run our own stand as a child or have stopped by one as an adult. There is no reason why we need to make this fun activity hard for children.”
When the bill passed the Senate in June, Doherty noted that “nobody is getting sick because a six-year-old’s lemonade stand didn’t get a health inspection, and professional vendors aren’t being driven out of business by the $5 a child might collect from supportive neighbors. Unfortunately, those are the exact excuses towns have used to put the smack down on entrepreneurial kids from coast to coast. It’s absolute nonsense that we shouldn’t tolerate here in New Jersey.”
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