Boiling point in North End
Wu decision on outdoor dining smacks of retaliation
Mayor Michelle Wu’s decision to target North End restaurants with an outdoor dining ban smacks of retaliation and has only widened the rift between small business owners and the city of Boston.
Wu this week announced by press release a new policy allowing Boston restaurants that pay a fee to set up dining patios on sidewalks or in parking spots — except in the North End.
In that busy neighborhood, where outdoor dining is the lifeblood of many restaurants, restaurants can only serve patrons on sidewalks — if they are wide enough. That key restriction will target and eliminate outdoor dining throughout much of the North End.
Wu’s office claims they are targeting one neighborhood because there are “unique challenges” to accessibility, traffic and sanitation in the tightly congested North End, and because of nearby construction projects.
“The North End’s sidewalks are very narrow, and so the patios can’t fit on the sidewalks,” she told WBUR’s “Radio Boston” last year. “They fit in the street, taking up parking spaces, putting diners close to traffic, in a neighborhood where there already were no alleys where food drop-off, deliveries and parking could happen.”
But it sure seems like Wu is seeking punishment for a few North End restaurant owners for filing a lawsuit last year against the city for imposing a $7,500 fee for outdoor dining just in the North End.
Wu doesn’t seem to mind when she eliminates hundreds of parking spots to make way for bike and bus lanes, but now she’s complaining about small businesses trying to make a living by taking a few street spots?
Wu’s new policy targeting North End restaurants is part of a pattern against the neighborhood and Italian Americans, according to the restaurant owners. Some Italian American groups are still stinging over the city taking down the Christopher Columbus statue in the North End.
That decision was made under previous Mayor Marty Walsh, who put the vandalized statue in storage to appease groups protesting Columbus.
The usually smiling Wu has been largely absent — leaving large gaps in her public schedule recently — except when she decides to do softball interviews.
But North End restaurant owners are filling the void — speaking out against what they consider a discriminatory abuse of power by Wu.
Expect more lawsuits to follow this latest decision, which means more taxpayer money going out the window to defend the city.
And expect more restaurant goers to avoid the North End on hot summer nights because they can’t find an outdoor dining table. Every seat is worth money to a restaurant, and she’s taking away thousands of dollars a week from restaurant owners.
To them, their neighborhood is under assault by Wu, who despite her talk about helping the little people, seems largely clueless and awkward when it comes to defending small businesses and mom-andpop outfits.
It’s just another case of a politician talking a lot, but not walking the walk.