417-mile trek to help raise awareness for unemployed

Hospitality worker who was laid off walks to DEO in Tallahassee

Beau Guyott, 46, is somewhere in Tosohatchee bear country waxing poetic about the hospitality industry.

“When I was in my late 20s, all the way through my 30s, I’d move around to different food scenes every few years,” he tells me. “I’d learn new cuisines. I’d make new friends. It’s really one of the most versatile careers. You can go anywhere, and if you have diverse experience, it’s easy to step right into a role and excel.”

That’s what he was doing in his new post at The Ben, a luxury waterfront hotel in West Palm Beach. Then came COVID-19. Then came layoffs. He’s just one of dozens of restaurant professionals in his network who’ve suffered the same fate.

“Nobody I know is upset with his or her employer,” says Guyott, who began his foray into food and beverage at 14, washing dishes in Englewood, Colorado. “This is way out of their hands.”

Florida’s handling of the subsequent unemployment crisis, he says, is another story entirely.

And so on April 18, he embarked on “The Walk to Tallahassee,” a 417-mile journey on which he’s been interviewing fellow restaurant professionals, those out of work and those struggling to stay in business, and one that will culminate with a visit to the Florida Department of Economic Opportunity (DEO). Once there, he hopes to share their stories, along with his own and see if anyone will accept accountability for the mess the state’s unemployed have encountered in their quest for benefits.

The Orlando Sentinel has been covering the breakdown in the system since the novel coronavirus hit, sending a tidal wave of new applications into the system.

“Every restaurant owner I’ve spoken with as things have gotten worse is more petrified than ever of laying off their employees,” says Guyott, who’s been spending most nights in a sleeping bag under the stars since the walk began. “Because they know they’ll be sending them into a completely shattered system that’s not working.”

Indeed, this past weekend, more than 200,000 new applicants were deemed ineligible for unemployment benefits. Several of Guyott’s friends among them.

“Not one person I have been talking to about this has seen a dime,” he says. “And today I spoke personally with 17 people who were denied benefits with no explanation. And so, they’ve reapplied. And now they wait again.”

Guyott however, isn’t. On his

walk he’s stopped into places like the Green Marlin in Vero Beach, where the owner is having his staff trim hedges, do paint touch-ups and small repairs around the restaurant to keep them working.

“They’ve moved all their refrigeration equipment out into the foyer and turned in into a mini-market, like a deli,” says Guyott. “Everyone is being really creative.”

At the family-run Chill & Grill, the owner’s son drove several miles looking for Guyott after he left without trying the chilled brownie for which they’re known.

“I was floored,” Guyott says of the gesture. “I don’t think I could ever put how good it tasted into words. What an unbelievably kind act.”

At the Sunrise Diner in Cocoa Beach, Guyott watched as the owner and chef took phone orders and delivered them to customers.

“There wasn’t one person whose name he didn’t know.

Not one person was a stranger.”

Guyott hopes to befriend a few new strangers during his brief stop in Orlando. He headed out Wednesday morning, bound for The Villages with more stories for those in the capital. Most of them about how folks can’t wait to get back to work.

“Rick Scott implied we don’t want to, that we’d rather sit on the couch for $275 a week than get back to work,” Guyott said, referencing the former Florida governor’s recent op-ed for FOX News.

What he’s seen on his walk so far, he says, is gratitude in both directions — owners grateful that workers will still come in for far fewer hours and far less pay and workers grateful for any hours, any pay, when they see so many others with no income at all.

“People who used to work 45 hours a week and now they’re working 30, but with no tips — helping package takeout orders or working the register and keeping things sanitized,” he says. He sees resilience. “‘I’m still here,’ they tell me. ‘I’ll make it.’”

Follow Guyott’s journey on Instagram at @thewalktotallahassee.

“People who used to work 45 hours a week and now they’re working 30, but with no tips.”

Beau Guyott, laid-off server raising awareness about unemployment

JOE BURBANK/ORLANDO SENTINEL “Every restaurant owner I’ve spoken with as things have gotten worse is more petrified than ever of laying off their employees,” says Guyott, 46.