Listen Live

(Mike Kemp/Getty Images)

There are few pleasures of a childhood that can compare with the quaint and charming experience of hearing the slightly off-pitch music of the ice cream man, running into traffic after his rusted-out van, and paying exorbitant prices for half-melted generic-brand treats. 

Yes, with the wisdom of adulthood, you realize the ice cream man was likely a convicted felon who made the decision upon release to paint and convert his existing windowless van and go into business for himself. It’s a double victory for a recently paroled pedophile gone legit: make some money and still be around kids. 

But the ice cream man best stay out of Beech Grove, Indiana, according to Mayor Dennis Buckley, who told WIBC hosts Hammer and Nigel that the city does not permit ice cream trucks or door to door salesmen to sell their products in neighborhoods. 

Mayor Buckley:

“Unfortunately, politicians are allowed. I wish we could do away with them as well; a lot of people don’t want someone knocking on their door.”

Mayor Buckley explained that licensed food trucks and ice cream vendors can park and sell their items, they just can’t be mobile.

“If you come into the city and sell food, who is to say that food was prepared in the right way? There has to be some provisions along with the Marion County health department that protects the people wanting to buy the food.

So if you want to have a food truck, that’s no problem. You get a permit through the city, you show proof of insurance, you show your latest health department certificate, and then you can set up your shop in a stationary position.”

Mayor Buckley also provided an update on the Beech Grove resident whose giant python escaped last month, nearly resulting in an international panic.

 Click below to hear Hammer and Nigel’s full interview with Mayor Buckley.