Restaurant owners have mixed reactions to easing of COVID restrictions

Gov. Steve Sisolak’s announcement Thursday loosening restrictions on certain Nevada businesses next week provides some relief to local bars and restaurants, although not as much as many were anticipating.

“My first reaction is that it was a little more conservative than I was expecting,” said Paul Hymas, president and co-founder of the Nacho Daddy chain, upon hearing the latest details of Sisolak’s roadmap to recovery.

Effective Feb. 15, indoor dining and beverage service will be limited to 35 percent capacity, up from the current 25 percent. Also, there will be no capacity limits on outdoor dining, the maximum party size will be raised from four people to six, and reservations no longer will be required.

Most local restaurateurs interviewed had been hoping that capacity limits would be raised to at least 50 percent. And not everyone was as restrained as Hymas in expressing their disappointment.

“What is 35 percent?” Elizabeth Blau, owner of Honey Salt and Buddy V’s Ristorante, asked upon hearing the new rules. “Come on — we’re not mathematicians, we’re restaurateurs.”

“Going from 25 percent to 35 percent, I feel like he’s doing that to say that he did something,” says Cory Harwell, owner of Carson Kitchen in downtown Las Vegas. “But it doesn’t move the needle at all for the small businesses that are suffering. I actually find it more insulting than if he would have had the chutzpah to just stay pat.”

Not everyone feels that way. Some, restaurant owners say that with social distancing requirements in place, raising the maximum size of parties allowed at tables is more beneficial than raising total capacity.

“We can’t even get to 50 percent because our tables (would be) closer than 6 feet to each other,” said Andy Hooper, owner of Locale Italian Kitchen and El Luchador Mexican Kitchen + Cantina.

Hooper said raising the maximum number of people allowed at a single table from four to six is “huge, just because we’re able to play with the 6-foot rule so much more with one large table, instead of having to accommodate a deuce and a four-top that are 6 feet apart from each other. Our flexibility is greatly increased.”

Harwell agrees that the limit on party size has been his greatest frustration since it was announced last year, though he would have liked to have seen it raised higher than six people.

“It’s (been) frustrating to see a carload of five or six, a family, arrive in one vehicle and have to sit at two separate tables.”

Hymas, who has turned away customers who would rather leave than split their party between two tables, is hopeful that allowing larger families and groups of friends will entice some of them back.

“People want to be social, and there are friends that they’ve lost touch with,” he said. “We are social beings, and we went through a big shock recently. So people want to inch their way closer to normal.”

At Town Square, Sickie’s Garage owner and CEO Kenneth Harris also had been hoping to see the capacity limit raised to 50 percent. Nonetheless, he believes eliminating the reservations-only rule will do a lot to attract people shopping at nearby retail stores.

“Eliminating (the need for) reservations is actually critical, so people know if they show up they’ll get seated,” he explains.

Harris also was pleased with the lifting of limits on outdoor dining capacity, saying that “now we have to figure out how to get more outdoor dining seats.”

As they contemplate the rules taking effect on Monday, many are already looking forward to the governor’s next round of easing restrictions.

“The good news is, March 1 he’s talking about 50 percent,” Blau said. “So we have real dates. We can put real budgets and numbers together to try and keep our businesses alive.”

Contact Al Mancini at amancini@reviewjournal.com. Follow @AlManciniVegas on Twitter.