In all the excitement of the NBA All-Star Weekend in February, many groups and companies set up events to draw the attention of the estimated 125,000 visitors to Utah.

One such event was the All-Star Bazaar, advertised as an expo for some 50 Black-owned businesses, along with a pop-up with a Black art gallery and displays on Black history and a living wax museum.

The bazaar didn’t work out the way organizers or vendors had hoped. Some of those vendors said they are out thousands of dollars, and the organizer said the permitting process shows a lack of access and resources for minority-owned businesses.

Here are five takeaways from what happened. (For the full account, read here.)

1. The All-Star Bazaar changed locations at the last minute because of permit paperwork issues.

The plan was to hold the All-Star Bazaar at Library Square, at 400 South and 200 East in Salt Lake City. But, early on Friday, Feb. 17 — the first day of the bazaar — vendors were told by email that the event would be moving to the Utah State Fairpark, at 1000 W. North Temple.

The last-minute location change stemmed from issues involving permit paperwork, according to Andrew Wittenberg, director of communications for Salt Lake City Mayor Erin Mendenhall.

“After missing significant deadlines leading up to the event date, city officials met with organizers multiple times over a 10-day period leading up to All-Star Weekend, in hopes of getting their event approved at their desired location,” Wittenberg wrote in an email to The Tribune. “Unfortunately, multiple pieces of necessary information were not provided.”

2. Local vendors lost thousands of dollars because of the change.

Roody Salvator, chef and owner of Utah’s Makaya Caters — a Haitian food truck — figures participating in the All-Star Bazaar cost him more than $7,000.

Anticipating big crowds, Salvator said, he washed his food truck and bought more than 600 pounds of meat. He also rented another food truck to two other vendors, Yvonne Nsabimana (of Ngoma Y’Africa) and Michaëlle Martial (a poet and chef), and several other African American immigrants and Black women, under the name “Taste the Culture.”

“What we [were] expecting is that people are going to be all over downtown, looking for things to do, and the marketing of [the bazaar] would drive people there,” Salvator said.

Salvator said that he made $105 in total sales on Friday and that the turnout was so low, he didn’t go back Saturday or Sunday.

3. Email exchanges between the organizer and government officials show a timeline behind the process.

Thursday, January 26 • Cleopatra Balfour, the bazaar’s organizer, and Ryen Schlegel, special events permit manager for Salt Lake City, first made contact to discuss permits for the bazaar.

Monday, February 6 • An aide to Balfour reached out to Schlegel at 1 p.m. to discuss the ADA plan, as part of the permitting process. The aide stated the city’s online portal for ADA information “currently populates an inactive Google form and not the official application.” Later that night, Schlegel, in an email to Balfour and her aide, wrote that the city had not received the site map info they expected a week earlier — and could not issue a final permit without “all approvals.”

Wednesday, February 8 • Schlegel sends a second email to Balfour and her aide, in which he writes: “We need proof of completion of all listed requirements by Monday 02/13/2023 before 05:00PM. Not receiving completed items by this time can jeopardize receiving a final permit.” Schlegel also provided a link to access the city’s online permitting portal.

Wednesday, February 15 • One day before vendors are expected to get started, Balfour sends a mass email to officials, stating that the All-Star Bazaar will be a “spontaneous event,” which “are exempted from special event permitting approval.”

Thursday, February 16 • In several emails to Balfour’s group, Kim Chytraus, a senior Salt Lake City attorney, said the bazaar is “not a spontaneous event,” and structures and equipment cannot be set up without a special events permit — and violating that rule could result in a misdemeanor. At noon, Chytraus asked the group to remove concrete blocks from the library plaza.

Read here for the full timeline, based on public records obtained by The Tribune.

4. Balfour said the permit issues point to a lack of access for minority communities to city property and resources.

Especially those who aren’t at “multimillion dollar companies” but volunteer organizations like her group, she said. For large companies, she said, it’s easier to pivot and fix issues that pop up.

“There’s nothing built in for equity of access to these city properties,” she said.

Balfour said that what happened with the bazaar permits was not down to one branch or department.

“It was so many different departments within the city that culminated to create a systemic problem that blocked access for [the] minority community during a time that it really should have been elevated,” she said.

5. Efforts are being made to help businesses make up for their losses.

The Utah Black Chamber of Commerce has been hosting a series of retail experiences at the Zions Bank Eagle Emporium in Salt Lake City. Dr. Sindi Shorter, president of the chamber, said that the first weekend was a success.

“As for the Chamber, we saw a need in the community and activated an opportunity with the help of chamber member Zions Bank,” she said in an email.

Though the permitting process can be time-consuming, especially for minority businesses, Wittenberg said the city’s economic development board and Mendenhall’s office are also interested in working with the vendors and businesses that were affected — whether through future events or by giving them tools to understand “what they need to know that an event is authentic and that it has been approved.”