Outdoor dining program extended
Changes come after a surprise crackdown by police on eateries
In an effort to help businesses ride the ebbs and flows of the pandemic, San Jose is extending a new program allowing businesses to operate in public and private outdoor spaces through next spring and summer.
Under the city’s Al Fresco program, downtown businesses now can stay open until midnight. The program, which launched earlier this summer to help businesses struggling from the economic fallout of forced closures and reduced operations, previously required businesses operating in public and private spaces outside of their establishments to close at 10 p.m.
Although the closing time was not initially enforced, two weeks ago San Jose police surprised several popular downtown restaurants with an order forcing them to shut down early, prompting business leaders to call on city officials to extend the Al Fresco hours for late-night dining.
Ahead of the colder winter months, the city also is allowing businesses to install heaters and set up large tents. New businesses that join the program and plan to put up tents may require inspections and reviews from the city’s Fire Department and Public Works Department, but the city is waiving permit fees through the end of the year.
Mike Messinger, the owner of Farmers Union in downtown San Jose, is hopeful that the city eventually will turn San Pedro Street from Santa Clara Street to St. John Street into a pedestrian-only strip and said the latest amendments to the program looked like a good step in that direction.
The street, which is one of the downtown area’s most popular nightlife centers, was closed to vehicular traffic earlier this summer under the city’s Al Fresco program to allow restaurants to open up more tables for outdoor dining.
“The closure not only helps Farmers Union have a lot more seating but it brings activity to the whole block and makes it more of a festive scene,” Messinger said. “And right now, we really need it. Seating inside at 25% doesn’t make a restaurant work; even at 50% it’ll be tough.”
Nathan Ulsh of the San Jose Downtown Association called the amendments to the program pertinent to the success of businesses across the city scrambling to find ways to bolster their winter operations.
“To extend the emergency ordinance through June 30, 2021, is also imperative to the success of Al Fresco ultimately sustaining business and mitigating vacancies downtown,” Ulsh said. “… In this scenario, many lives literally depend on businesses to continue downtown and beyond.”
At a meeting this week, Council members Sergio Jimenez and Raul Peralez both urged city leaders to explore options for keeping the city’s Al Fresco program around even after the pandemic is over. “I would hope and advocate that we continue this indefinitely,” Peralez said.
The program has considerably grown and morphed since its first conception. What began as an opportunity for restaurants and businesses such as fitness studios to move their operations outdoors into private parking lots and sidewalks now has led to three street closures across the city and the opportunity for businesses to move into underused public spaces such as parks, plazas and cityowned parking lots as well.
The city has expanded the type of businesses permitted to take part in the program to include casinos, hair salons and personal service businesses, such as art studios and dry cleaners. As of early November, more than 150 restaurants and businesses across the city were taking part in it.
“There’s no doubt the Al Fresco program is helping many of our small businesses to survive and that surviving keeps more people employed and earning paychecks, and that’s a good thing,” Councilwoman Pam Foley said.
Into the orange tier
When Santa Clara County moved into the orange tier of California’s reopening plan last month, restaurants, museums and churches were allowed to open up their indoor spaces to 25% capacity or up to 100 people — whichever is fewer.
As part of the county’s order, indoor dining must close by 12:30 a.m.
Although some businesses, such as bars and restaurants, had pre-pandemic hours of operation open until 1 or 2 a.m., San Jose officials decided to require outdoor operations wrap up at midnight to adhere closer to the county’s indoor dining restrictions and limit the length of gatherings.
“Quite honestly, we are also still in a pandemic and there is still concern about large gatherings of people in places, so it seemed like going until midnight made sense,” Blage Selalich of the city’s Office of Economic Development said during the council meeting Nov. 3.
Following the death of a woman who was killed when an SUV crashed into an outdoor dining area in East San Jose last month, the city is adding a requirement aimed at bolstering the safety of patrons. New businesses applying for a permit to operate on private outdoor properties or a sidewalk will be required to install safety barriers to separate patrons from cars driving by. City staffers plan to notify businesses that have already self-registered to encourage them to make their outdoor setups safer.
“It should be noted that given the nature of these outdoor operations, there is no way to entirely protect outdoor business areas from all threats,” Deputy City Manager Kim Walesh wrote in a city document about the plan. “Private property owners and businesses will continue to be responsible for ensuring that their employees, contractors and guests are safe while in outdoor business areas.”