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Pasadena restaurants received a lifeline this week when city officials walked away from Los Angeles County’s three-week outdoor dining ban and chose, instead, to allow their residents. restaurants to continue to serve customers outside.
However, with this privilege came an increased responsibility to follow strict protocols for the health and safety of clients. As of Saturday morning, five restaurants had been closed for failing to follow established COVID-19 protocols, city spokeswoman Lisa Derderian said.
Those restaurants, which had received prior warnings, had their health permits suspended, meaning their kitchens were completely closed until they passed a new inspection, she said.
Violations included employees not wearing face masks over masks, barriers not in place separating hosts from guests, and tables placed too close to each other. In some cases, the tables were inside when told they needed to be moved outside, Derderian said. There were also crowds gathered outside the restaurants.
This week, the city hosted a webinar with more than 100 restaurateurs to reiterate the enhanced enforcement, Derderian said.
The city has not publicly named the restaurants that have been closed, she said, but their owners will have a hearing with city officials by Monday.
“It’s pretty immediate,” she said of the closures. “The staff is affected and some of these restaurants have 30 to 40 employees, so it’s a big success.”
If restaurants pass the re-inspection, she added, they can reopen as soon as they have staff in place to do so.
On Saturday evening, Derderian said at least two of those restaurants were given the green light to reopen after hearings with the city’s health department and reinspections.
“Knowing that the weekend was going to be busy, (the health inspectors) wanted to get them back up and running as soon as possible,” she said.
The city has its own health department, which enabled it to make the decision to continue eating outdoors. Long Beach is the only other city in the county to have its own health department, but it has gone hand in hand with the county.
Some restaurateurs were not scared by the closures, saying increased inspections were a necessary procedure in exchange for being allowed to eat out.
“The city has done everything it can to allow us to open up and I’m sure there is a lot of pressure from their side,” said Jack Huang, owner of Sorisso Bar-Celona since 2000. “Certainly there is will have people who won’t … don’t take it so seriously, we know we’re going to do the right thing.
Huang’s restaurant was not among the five closed, but after hearing the news, he immediately messaged his management staff to let them know the city was serious.
“We don’t want to be on this list,” said Huang, 63. “We want to lead by example.”
News of the city’s plan to keep its restaurants open for patio dining caused restaurants to swell on Friday, a day when most go shopping on Black Friday and eat Thanksgiving leftovers, Huang said.
“The whole town felt like the day before the Rose Parade there were so many people,” he says.
Other owners were also grateful that the city enforced the rules at individual restaurants rather than shutting them all down.
“The people who should be penalized are the ones who don’t follow protocol, not the ones who are,” said Gregg Smith, owner of three Pasadena restaurants. “A lot of us have spent a lot of money on outdoor dining.”
Gregg Smith, who co-owns Arroyo Chop House, Smitty’s and Parkway Grill in Pasadena, said the owners are all working together to be diligent in following CDC protocols.
Derderian said some owners were self-checking others to make sure they were in compliance and following a state order to close at 10 p.m. Smith said he was participating in the auto-police group.
“It’s only in the best interests of our customers and our staff trying to keep them employed,” he said.
In addition to increased enforcement in restaurants, Derderian said enforcement would be strengthened in businesses, parks and other potential gathering areas to ensure compliance with health ordinances.
“We’ve been trying to achieve compliance through education for quite some time now,” she said. “Seeing how the numbers of COVID are increasing significantly, we need to balance the health and safety of the community with an economic impact.”
Writer Jonah Valdez contributed to this story.
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