Hope for struggling restaurants
COURIER LIFE, FEBRUARY 12-18, 2021 17
BY ANDREW RIGIE AND ROBERT
BOOKMAN
The nation’s restaurants
and bars are dying rapidly from
COVID-19, and like the new vaccine
that will save American
lives, the $25 billion restaurant
relief package passed by the
U.S. Senate last week will save
American small businesses.
Since the coronavirus hit,
more than 110,000 restaurants
around the country have shuttered,
and countless more eateries
and drinking establishments
are teetering on the edge
of survival. What’s more troubling
is that approximately
three quarters of restaurant
owners who closed for good
say it’s unlikely they’ll open
another venture in the future,
jeopardizing the odds of returning
2.5 million restaurant and
bar jobs lost in 2020, including
372,000 jobs in December alone.
Saving our neighborhood
restaurants and bars is not a
Democrat, Republican, or Independent
issue, it is a deeply
American issue. Whether you
live in New York, the greatest
city in the world, or the heartland,
restaurants are essential
to the social and economic fabric
of our communities. Restaurants
are where we traditionally
share family time and
special occasions, go on fi rst
dates and mark anniversaries,
cheers with coworkers after a
long week, and where millions
of Americans have gotten their
fi rst jobs and so many others
have elevated their careers.
The tragic truth is that up
until this point, some in government
have stood by in waiting
as the restaurant industry
crumbles from pressures and
forces outside of its control. The
combination of COVID-19 and
severe restrictions limiting
business operations has cooked
up a recipe that threatens the
viability of restaurants around
the country. But it is not too late
for our elected leaders to do the
right thing and prevent the permanent
loss of even more beloved
restaurants and jobs.
If the banks were too big to
fail in 2008, our country’s restaurants
are too critical to collapse
in 2021. We do not seek
a bailout as the fi nancial industry
did following a series
of wrong and self-serving actions,
instead we deserve our
government’s support because
we’ve done everything right –
whether it is feeding frontline
workers, combatting food insecurity
among children and
seniors, keeping employees on
the payroll as long as possible,
or closing our doors for the
greater good.
The Biden Administration
faces the monumental challenge
of restarting the economy
while preserving public health.
Fortunately, the blueprints for
saving restaurants have already
been prepared and the solution
is ready to be built. Last
year, Senate Majority Leader
(and Brooklyn born) Charles
Schumer was a leading advocate
and fi ghter for the RESTAURANTS
Act, which earned
over 50 sponsors in the Senate
and passed in the House, and
now the 117th Congress must
pass a version of this dedicated
restaurant relief.
Unlike the recently passed
Paycheck Protection Program,
which is better suited for other
industries but is a band-aid on a
cannon wound for restaurants,
the new $25 billion structed revitalization
fund modeled on
the RESTAURANTS Act would
provide struggling restaurants
with grants to pay for months of
missed rent, payroll for workers,
vendor expenses and more.
And let us not forget the industry’s
underemployed and
unemployed workers who just
like restaurant owners have
had their lives shattered. So, we
need to also get workers more
direct support and enact this
stimulus for restaurants, so
they have jobs to return to.
Now, it’s critical that lawmakers
put politics aside and
enact a stimulus plan that supports
restaurants across the
country that have been absolutely
devastated by the pandemic.
The restaurant recovery
fund will put the nation’s
hospitality industry on a path
to recovery so that hundreds of
thousands of small businesses
and millions of workers have
the opportunity to get back
on their feet and welcome you
again into their dining rooms
and bars after one of the most
harrowing crises in our country’s
history.
Andrew Rigie is the Executive
Director of the NYC Hospitality
Alliance and Robert
Bookman is on the Counsel of
the NYC Hospitality Alliance.
OP-ED
MTA’s wish list for Senate Leader
Schumer and Transit Secretary Buttigieg
BY PATRICK J. FOYE
With Secretary Pete Buttigieg
now confi rmed by the
Senate to lead the U.S. Department
of Transportation, the
MTA is ready to work with the
new secretary and his team to
revive mass transit and support
economic recovery from
this unprecedented crisis.
Secretary Buttigieg is a
smart leader with an ambitious
agenda; we’re confident
we can find common
ground to start delivering
improvements for New Yorkers
right away.
During his confi rmation
hearings, Secretary Buttigieg
rightly recognized that we
have a once-in-a-generation
opportunity to create new
jobs, fi ght economic inequality
and advance climate goals
by investing in mass transit.
These efforts must start with
the inclusion of $39.3 billion
to address devastating fi nancial
shortfalls of public transit
agencies nationwide in the
next federal COVID-19 relief
package.
Last week, my fellow industry
leaders and I sent a letter to
Senate Majority Leader Chuck
Schumer, House Speaker
Nancy Pelosi, and Minority
Leaders Mitch McConnell
and Kevin McCarthy to again
make the case for signifi cant
additional emergency aid.
The $4 billion Senator
Schumer helped secure for the
MTA in December’s federal
COVID-19 relief bill will get us
through 2021 without the draconian
service cuts that had previously
been on the table, but
we continue to face signifi cant
shortfalls in 2022-2024.
We thank Senator Schumer
for continuing his fi ght for mass
transit in New York, and the
MTA in particular. But without
additional funding to fi ll those
budget gaps, the hands of the
MTA and other agencies could
still be forced to implement
drastic cuts to service, make
unthinkable layoffs and/or delay
or cancel critical capital
projects starting in 2022.
Now that COVID-19 vaccines
are here, we need a strong
public transportation network
more than ever to power New
York’s recovery. Our services
are an indispensable lifeline
for health professionals, fi rst
responders, food service and
other essential workers on the
front lines of the pandemic.
Federal investment will not
only keep buses and trains running,
it will help strengthen
critical infrastructure for decades
to come.
We do have reason for hope
as recent reports indicate that
Senator Schumer expects the
next COVID relief package will
include emergency aid for mass
transit nationally, and we look
forward to working with him,
Secretary Buttigieg and the
Biden administration to make
it happen at the levels we so urgently
need.
Together we can invest in
new transit capital projects
like Second Avenue Subway
Phase 2, make 70 subway stations
accessible, improve access
to transit for customers of
all abilities and incomes, and
accelerate federal reviews of
key projects.
The next four years have
the potential to be truly transformative.
We have in President
Biden the nation’s most
famous advocate of mass transit;
Senator Schumer is the
fi rst Senate Majority Leader
from New York, the fi rst who
can understand our needs on
a personal level; and now Secretary
Buttigieg is leading
USDOT, supported by former
NYC Transportation Commissioner
Polly Trottenberg
as Deputy Secretary. All the
pieces are in place, we can’t let
this opportunity pass us by.
Finally, I want to conclude
with some much-deserved recognition
for thousands of dedicated
MTA workers and managers
who helped guide our
system through last week’s
massive snow storm. In what
has been the toughest year in
our history, they once again
stepped up to prove why they
are truly essential workers
and why the federal government
needs to come through
for them.
Patrick J. Foye is MTA
chair and CEO.