Proposal has ice cream vendors fuming

Caitlin Hudgins

Friday, July 2, 2004 | 11:10 a.m.

One of the long-standing traditions of summer -- the ice cream truck -- is at the center of a controversy that is melting the vendors' Good Humor.

Clark County health officials want to enforce a regulation that would force vendors to install expensive refrigeration equipment that vendors say is simply overkill.

Ice cream truck drivers have, for the last 60 years, used dry ice to keep their wares frozen because dry ice is denser and colder than regular ice, said Peggy Hasselbalch, a former ice cream lady who now supplies vendors.

It's also cheaper than refrigeration.

But health officials say dry ice can create fumes that can overcome a driver, and thus the Health District wants it out of ice cream trucks.

Most vendors, who use dry ice despite the regulation, are, well, cool to the proposal and think the health department's arguments are silly.

"Ice cream has always been sold with dry ice," Hasselbalch said, "and there have never been problems with it."

Health officials had planned to require drivers to dump the dry ice this week but balked facing strong protests.

Hasselbalch said the number of vendors who support the move "is zero."

"So they (the Health District) realized that it wasn't going to work," she said.

But the vendors haven't won yet. The deadline has been pushed to the end of the year so inspectors can see if the dry ice really keeps things frozen while the Health Board re-examines the rules.

The issue, of course, is not as simple as melted ice cream.

Freezers are made to be cooled by refrigeration, and dry ice is a threat to the vendors' health and the correct operation of their freezers, the health district spokeswoman Jennifer Sizemore said.

Vendors say the power units are an unnecessary cost that forces them to keep their trucks running all day, raising temperatures for them and adding to the Las Vegas Valley's pollution.

And the debate gets stickier as each side cites its reasons.

Fumes from the dry ice, which is frozen carbon dioxide, poses a health danger to vendors in their small trucks, health officials say. The carbon dioxide given off as the dry ice evaporates can deprive those who inhale it of oxygen and, in a worst-case situation, suffocate someone.

Warnings from the World Health Organization's International Programme on Chemical Safety confirm the health hazard of carbon dioxide. Inhaling the fumes can cause dizziness, headache, elevated blood pressure and abnormally fast heartbeat, according to the organization's Web site.

The health district said drivers could get into accidents if they become light-headed from inhaling dry ice, though they do not have any examples of that happening.

Besides, health district officials argue, freezers in ice cream trucks were made to be connected to a power source and dry ice should only be used as a supplement. If the freezers are not used as intended, their warranties are void, Sizemore said. The health district is just trying to protect vendors, she said.

Vendors counter that dry ice cannot be used as a supplement to refrigeration. If vendors put dry ice in refrigerated freezers, the thermostats will register the cold temperature and shut off, allowing the ice cream to melt, Hasselbalch said.

And, said Tammy Vanderheiden, a Las Vegas ice cream vendor for 11 years, the five-pound blocks of ice vendors use in their freezers do not create enough fumes to pose any problems, especially since those fumes are heavier than air and sink to the ground, away from vendors' faces.

Hasselbalch said that adding a power source to ice cream truck freezers would be too expensive for vendors.

The county Board of Health says refrigeration units can be had for as little as $79, but Hasselbalch said that most systems she has seen sell for around $2,000.

Vanderheiden says refrigerated units also make the trucks too hot.

"An inverter (power source) would generate more heat in the vehicle," Vanderheiden said, "and they (drivers) could suffer from heat stroke."

In addition, Hasselbalch said, refrigeration would be environmentally unsound.

Since the refrigeration would get its power from a truck's engine, the engine would have to be running constantly, she said.

"Now if an ice cream truck is stopped, there is no pollution," she said, "But if a truck has an inverter (a power source), it (the engine) has to run at all times."

The carbon monoxide from trucks idling does add to the area's pollutants, but not enough to make a difference, according to Department of Air Quality Compliance Manager Bob Folle.

In addition, refrigerated trucks are exempt from county rules that prohibit vehicles from idling more than 15 minutes, he said.

The plain vanilla core of the controversy, however, is the quality of the ice cream.

Melted ice cream produces bacteria, and each side insists that their preferred method is better at preventing melting.

The health district thinks a power source keeps ice cream at the appropriate temperature, but Vanderheiden says dry ice, with a temperature of -109.3 degrees Farenheit, keeps ice cream coldest.

Vendors put dry ice on top of their ice cream to keep it hard, Vanderheiden said, but a power source doesn't keep the exposed tops of ice cream buckets from melting.

Hasselbalch said when health inspectors install data loggers to monitor the temperature for 24 hours in ice cream truck freezers this summer, they will see the vendors are right.

"I love ice cream trucks and everything to do with them," Hasselbalch said. "It's sad that they (the Health District) want to have control over ice cream vendors when every ice cream man out there already does a great job of keeping his ice cream cold."