Restaurant reopens after paying tax debt
The Bear Café, which was shut down for being $17,000 in arrears, was closed for just under 24 hours.
The Bear Café has reopened after being shut down by the state for nonpayment of state sales taxes.
John Kirkpatrick said Friday that he paid slightly more than $17,000 that was overdue, allowing the state Department of Taxation and Finance to remove the “SEIZED” notice from the restaurant’s main entrance.
Kirkpatrick said the restaurant, at 295 Tinker St. (state Route 212) reopened at 4 p.m. Thursday. It was shut down about 5:15 p.m. Wednesday.
“We lost one night of service,” he said.
“It inconvenienced some customers, and I feel badly about that,” he added. “We really appreciate our loyal group of customers and family that comes here.”
The state tax department posted two notices in the business’ entrance Wednesday evening. One of them, on orange paper, had the word “SEIZED” in large black type, and a smaller-print message that read, “This property has been seized for nonpayment of taxes, and is now in possession of the state of New York.”
The closing did not involve the other businesses on the property, which include the Little Bear restaurant, Utopia Studios, radio station WDST-FM and the Bearsville Theater.
Kirkpatrick said he was grateful to the state tax representatives who worked with him to resolve the tax issue and bring the Bear Café into compliance. He said the problem was that he underestimated a quarterly sales tax amount he owed for late 2017.
“I won’t make the same mistake twice,” he said.