Restaurant chain’s abrupt closings prompt call for probe

State Sen. Matthew Lesser wants officials with the state Department of Labor to investigate whether the Ninety Nine Restaurant chain violated any state or federal laws by closing without any advance notice.

Lesser, a Democrat from Middletown, said Thursday in a Facebook post that he had requested the Labor Department investigation because Ninety Nine officials shut down the chain’s Connecticut locations in Cromwell, Groton and Stratford on Nov. 28 “with no notice to staff just as we are entering the holiday season.”

Lesser was not immediately available to provide further comment on the request he made to state Labor Department officials.

Ninety Nine’s corporate offices are located in Woburn, Mass. Officials there did not return calls made by Hearst Connecticut Media regarding the reason employees were not given advanced notice of the closing or how many of its workers were being laid off.

Juliet Manalan, a spokeswoman for the Connecticut Labor Department, said businesses are required to notify the U.S. Department of Labor through the Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act if they meet certain thresholds. Generally speaking, the threshold at which companies are required to give 60days advance notice of a mass layoff is 100 or more full-time workers losing their jobs.

“If they don’t meet that threshold, federal law does not require them to file the pending closure or layoff,” Manalan said. She said it was not immediately clear whether the layoffs resulting from the closing of the Ninety Nine Restaurant locations met the federal threshold.

Any enforcement action that might be taken against the company would be determined by the federal Labor Department, she said.

Manalan said state officials “appreciate that Senator Lesser contacted us as this company many not have been required to file, but it helped get Rapid Response services to laid off workers faster.” The agency’s Rapid Response unit helps workers find new jobs and provide transitional support services, she said.

“We assist with unemployment and can attach dislocated workers to free employment services,” Manalan said. The company sent a statement last week to Hearst Connecticut Media saying it was looking to place workers from the three Connecticut restaurants that were closed in jobs at other locations in the state. With the Connecticut restaurants closing, Ninety Nine has eight locations in the state.

The casual food restaurant chain is a subsidiary of Nashvillebased Restaurant Growth Services.