‘None of us want to take a step backwards’
State’s bars likely will have to wait a little longer before expanding service
Bar owners and patrons entered the holiday weekend with a punch in the gut, as Gov. Ned Lamont said expanded bar service will not be included, after all, in the initial phase three reopenings coming in two weeks.
Many are taking it in stride. With recent decisions in New York and New Jersey to hold off on indoor restaurant dining as the nation sees a rise in COVID-19 cases, the pressure is on Connecticut’s hospitality industry to keep the infection rate down.
“I think the bars are going to have to take a pause right now,” Lamont told reporters Thursday, adding he’ll make a formal announcement as soon as Monday.
Hours later in South Norwalk, a nice crowd filled the patio tables at Burger Bar & Bistro but inside remained empty with stools upside down on the bar. That has cost the place maybe half its revenue, even now, said manager and co-owner Edward Petri.
But he backs Lamont on the decision. “I believe there is the right time to open. I don’t want my customers getting sick,” he said.
Mostly idle since March, or surviving on truncated service for food and drinks, bars will likely have to wait longer before they
can get back to business approaching normal, as the coronavirus flare-ups throughout the United States are ominous. In contrast to some industries, such as salons, which made a lot of noise about reopening, bar and restaurant owners, like Petri in Norwalk, seem resigned to the new reality.
Scott Dolch, executive director of the Connecticut Restaurant Association, said that while many bar owners are anxious, the majority understand that reopening is going to require preparation and strict adherence to safety protocols.
“Spacing distancing, folks wearing masks are all part of this conversation,” Dolch said, praising Lamont’s administration for its communications with the industry. “There’s definitely frustration. Obviously it’s a sector of our industry that’s told they can’t open.”
‘Things are constantly shifting’
Nearly every Connecticut establishment is different, operating in numerous circumstances under dozens of different types of liquor licenses.
Tim Cabral, co-owner of Ordinary, on Chapel Street across from the New Haven Green, has a full commercial kitchen, but with limited seating in a landmark space that claims fame as the oldest bar in the city, he hasn’t yet opened for even limited indoor dining. He has virtually no outdoor space.
“One of the hard realities in what happened is, we lost all our graduation business, and that usually floats us through the summer,” he said. “We’re still far away from even figuring out what the new normal is. We don’t have a bar [only] license, so we could have opened whenever we wanted, but things are constantly shifting. I don’t fault anybody. You roll with it, figure it out and do what you can.”
Cabral has been supervising renovations to update socially distant indoor seating, while maintaining a presence in the market by offering takeout dishes and drinks. But he’s surprised at how successful his twicea-month virtual cocktail hours have worked with patrons.
“People have been nice enough to let us into their homes,” Cabral said. At mid-week, patrons pick up the makings of cocktails at Ordinary, located one block from the Yale campus, take them home and tune in every other Friday night. In recent weeks, Cabral has teamed up with local chefs for food and booze pairings.
“People are getting dressed up,” Cabral recalled. “One couple puts the computer on their bar and they sit on their bar stools and watch me on the bar.”
But all-in-all, it has been a rough shutdown.
Cabral’s hoping that by early August, Ordinary will be able to finally reopen.
Inclined to pause
Restaurants and bars with food service in the state have been able to sit customers indoors during Phase 2, which started June 17, but capacity has been limited to 50 percent. People have been allowed to sit at bars if they ordered food, were seated six feet apart from others and were shielded by plastic.
Bar and restaurant owners were hoping to relax restrictions further, including by serving drinks only, without the food requirement, by mid-July.
Dolch said that after six weeks of outdoor dining and two weeks of limited inside seating, restaurants are ready to expand, but they also understand the risks and realities involved.
“None of us want to take a step backwards,” Dolch said. “We’ve done an amazing job. Let’s continue to look at guidelines and rules . ... The biggest thing right now is to not try to get ahead of ourselves. Yes, some days we would like to open sooner, but as a whole our members take it to heart.”
Lamont said at the moment he’s looking at other parts of the country where transmission of the coronavirus is on the rise.
“I’m sort of inclined to think about a pause before we do anything else, because I’m thinking about the flare-ups,” Lamont said. “They’re getting closer to Connecticut. Thank God we’ve got good neighbors, with low infection rates as well.”
Shoulder-to-shoulder
On a balmy evening this week at South Norwalk’s restaurant row, the challenges of enforcing social distancing as restrictions are relaxed were evident.
Opposite the SoNo sign on Washington Street, a few men were seated at Local Kitchen & Beer Bar, which has installed Plexiglas shields running the length of its centerpiece bar, with plenty of distance in between seats.
But in other places, dozens of patrons thronged outside service areas, squeezing in shoulder-to-shoulder at some tables that were otherwise spaced six feet apart. While bar and restaurant staff seemed to be properly masked in establishments, less could be said for many patrons.
David Lehman, commissioner of the state Department of Economic and Community Development, said that the administration is still weighing the data rolling in on COVID-19 case rates, both in Connecticut and in other states in varying stages of reopening.
This week, the co-chair of the White House’s COVID-19 task force raised anew the issue of bars as potential hot spots for coronavirus transmission, with Florida, Texas and California among the states that have reimposed closures as cases have increased, turning back the reopening clock by weeks, if not months.
“We think there’s a preference for activities outdoors,” Lehman said. “But it’s really tough when people are drinking, when it comes to adhering to the rules.”
Wait and see
“I have definitely gotten calls from bar owners asking what they should do and I say to be as strict as we need to be,” Dolch said. “We need a chance to get back on our feet again. The good thing is that Phase 3 isn’t until around July 20 and there is still a lot of information we have to gather, so let’s let the July Fourth weekend play out and continue to protect our employees and customers, then on July, 6, 7, 8 we can start a conversation about Phase 3. No one’s in a business model of profitability.”
Lamont’s idea had been to ease in the reopening phases based on data from Connecticut, and on coordination with neighboring states. This state, like New York and Massachusetts, has seen marked improvement, with fewer than 100 people in hospitals with COVID-19 and tests results coming in less than 1 percent positive over the last week or so, under 2 percent for all of June.
But the governor, speaking Thursday at Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison, said Connecticut data on infections and hospitalizations is important, but so is news from elsewhere, even as far away as the West Coast.
“If I hear the governor of California say opening bars in L.A. led to a big surge, because they went from a very low infection rate to a very high one, I think we get informed by that, don’t we?”
“I am going to err on the side of caution,” he said.
“I urge you to go outdoors. It’s just much, much safer. I think the bars are going to have to take a pause right now. Let’s get a little closer to showtime, then I can be exact.”