NYC latino restaurant owners push back on pandemic fines to avoid closure

Latino restaurant owners say that in addition to the losses due to Covid-19, they must pay fines for violations of infection protection measures.

In October, New York City officials expanded the city’s vaccine mandate, requiring all city employees to be vaccinated, with no test-out option. The mandate also requires restaurant guests and employees to prove that they have received at least one dose of the vaccine.

Restaurants that do not comply with vaccine checks can be fined more than $1,000 for a first offense, $2,000 for a second, and $5,000 for each additional violation.

The mandate, however, has deeply affected restaurants by driving away customers and exposing staff to angry guests, according to the New York State Restaurant Association (NYSRA). Some restaurants are going as far as adding security guards to protect staff.

One restaurant was fined $9,000 because an employee was cleaning tables without a mask after closing hours, said Susana Osorio, owner of several NY restaurants. 

“We went down 90% in revenue like everyone else,” said the owner of a New York restaurant in an interview. “Now, with the mandate, the government hasn’t given us the proper tools…they think we can police something that is so mishandled. I can’t tell someone their vaccine card is invalid. My daughter could print out that vaccination card and write it out in pen and you could not tell the difference.”

In a recent survey by NYSRA, 76.8 percent of respondents said the safety measures had cost them business and found that restaurants canceled 61.6 percent of group events because of the mandate.

“Operators are losing business and staff,” Melissa Fleischut, the NYSRA’s CEO, said in a statement. “The mandate is a burden on an industry that cannot bear anymore.”

A group of restaurants has filed a lawsuit against Mayor Bill de Blasio over the mandate. The businesses argue that the mandate violates their constitutional rights and unfairly targets some establishments.

Since March 2020, more than 1,000 restaurants have closed down in the Big Apple, due to the economic downturn caused by the pandemic.