City Council Speaker Julie Menin is absolutely right in promising to repair the bungled outdoor dining program, whose current form has seen a fraction of the roughly 8,000 cafés and restaurants that participated at the height of the COVID pandemic apply, with only some 400 receiving full approval last year.
The previous Council made the roadbed eateries permanent, but wrongly required that the structures be seasonal, only permitted between April 1 and Nov. 29. So every November they have to be removed, carted away and stored and every spring hauled out again.
Menin has thrown her support behind the framework legislation introduced by Brooklyn Councilman Lincoln Restler, which would make the outdoor dining program year-round and bring down some of the costs and bureaucratic requirements that have acted as hurdles for business owners to participate.
The maximalists on this issue always discuss it like there’s no possible compromise. Either sheds and other outdoor structures are a blight that must be constrained or prohibited altogether lest it block vehicles, rid the city of street parking, destroy accessibility and become an unbridled rat haven, or they’re the undisputed saviors of restaurants and the ultimate triumph of the cosmopolitan spirit that should be left to flourish unchallenged.
While there are some issues on which there should be no compromise, that’s not the case when it comes to outdoor dining. We reject the idea that New Yorkers have to choose between positively expanding public leisure space and providing a needed opportunity for local businesses, and avoiding the creation of some sort of public health hazard, as critics contend.
In fact, the current situation is itself the result of a compromise that was not ultimately well thought out, putting too many onerous requirements on small businesses with already thin margins that could not necessarily afford to take down and reset sheds every season or pay exorbitant application fees. What the speaker and others are asking for now is simply another compromise, one that will better hit the balance of interests and satisfy the various constituencies involved.
Eric Adams wanted year round sheds when he was mayor, but the Council refused. Zorhan Mamdani has a Council that’s going the other way and he seems supportive.
Restaurants and cafés have been struggling acutely ever since the COVID pandemic, which compounded ongoing issues around rent and insurance and labor costs. Their long-term survival is far from guaranteed, and can you imagine a New York City without a robust ecosystem of eateries and coffee shops, serving pretty much every cuisine on Earth and catering to people of all backgrounds? It’s not the kind of city we want to have, and it is incumbent on our leaders now to act to preserve practically the only positive thing to come out of a pandemic that devastated us.
Let’s get this done now, while this frigid cold front makes the idea of outdoor seating seem laughable, so that by the time the much-awaited spring rolls around, our eateries can confidently put up their sheds, knowing the city has their back.
