Businesses clamor for clarification
nowabandoned system that restricted business reopenings, last week as infection rates dropped.
Laurie Thomas, executive director of the Golden Gate Restaurant Association, said the state’s designation of San Francisco as an area with fewer restrictions, combined with lack of clarity from officials, led to widespread confusion on Friday. Some restaurant owners erroneously assumed that restaurants could resume some indoor dining immediately, and she fielded about a dozen phone calls after the state’s announcement from people seeking clarification.
“We really need clarity,” she said, urging city officials to tell indoor businesses definitively that they can’t reopen yet.
“Sharing this information is going to create false hope,” Thomas said of the state’s new system. “A lot of us are struggling for financial survival. The ability to do indoor dining at 25% would make a huge difference.”
Napa County and San Francisco are listed as red under the state’s new system, which means officials there can allow indoor dining at reduced capacity. But, Thomas said, health data must support that partially reopening indoors is safe.
Thomas said restaurants need as much advance notice as possible and detailed reopening instructions to plan worker schedules and not waste perishable food in anticipation of an indoor reopening. There also needs to be better coordination between the state and city, she said.
“We all need to work much closer as a team,” she said. “I’m just very frustrated.”
“San Francisco is currently reviewing the state’s new tiered system for reopening and how it impacts the city’s future reopening. However, any changes in San Francisco are still subject to the decisions of our local public health officials,” Breed said in a statement. “Nothing has changed today here in San Francisco based on the state’s new system.”
The San Francisco Chamber of Commerce said restaurants have been particularly hardhit by shutdowns, despite having the option to do outdoor dining. Credit card data show that restaurant sales were down 84% in July from the previous year, and that more than half of the city’s restaurants aren’t currently completing credit card sales, suggesting they are closed.
In the Financial District, restaurant owner Olivier Azancot said he’s more concerned about the overall lack of foot traffic in the neighborhood, due to the closures of nearby offices and hotels, than the potential for indoor dining.
“People are not coming out because of COVID in this neighborhood, so even 25% of the business inside wouldn’t make a difference,” he said. “The funny part is right now we’re not allowed to have indoor dining and then outdoor dining is tough because of the air quality.”
Azancot’s restaurants are on Belden Place, a small stretch between Bush and Pine streets, and while his outdoor dining space has the occasional crowd of diners, he said, it’s rarely full.
“There’s just nobody around to sustain anything,” he said.
“The overlap of state and local regulations and constantly evolving public health guidelines have made it difficult for business owners to understand what they are allowed to do. Everybody wants to follow the rules, but it can be hard to follow what the current rules are. It’s going to be critical for our local public health officials to be crystalclear about what is permissible and safe,” Jay Cheng, the chamber’s public policy director, said in a statement.
Some personal care business and gym owners, whose firms have been shuttered since midMarch, have said San Francisco’s shutdown orders are too restrictive. They held a protest on Tuesday outside City Hall.
“The city has announced no plans for how they are going to reopen the dying fitness industry and when,” Dave Karraker, a gym owner who represents a coalition of similar businesses, said in a statement Friday.
Shortly before the new state system was announced, Breed said barbershops, gyms and nail salons can begin operating outdoors in the city Tuesday. She confirmed that those reopenings would proceed separately from the state’s new plan.
Cretan said the city has sought to limit the spread of the coronavirus with its shutdown measures so businesses wouldn’t be forced to close shortly after reopening if cases rise.
“We have to prioritize public health,” he said.
Chronicle staff writer Justin Phillips contributed to this report.