What’s wrong with making the pandemic emergency restaurant program permanent?
When temporary outdoor dining started in June of 2020, just about everyone supported it. Indoor dining wasn’t allowed because of the Covid-19 pandemic. Restaurants could get up and running again. And their residential neighbors were happy to see local eateries back in business – with the understanding, as per the program’s title, that this use of public property would be “temporary.”
So let’s start right there on the “what’s wrong” list. In just three months, Mayor De Blasio, the City Council, and lobbyists from the Hospitality Alliance redefined “temporary” as permanent. And let’s be painfully clear here: permanent = forever.
Changing the landscape of every street and every sidewalk in a great city like New York forever ought to involve a significant public discussion. This one didn’t. When community boards were asked their opinion, a majority of those who answered said they didn’t want this vast change. Those community boards were then ignored by the same pols who appointed their members – including then Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams.
Public property should, and by law does, belong to the public. But for two and half years, that public property has been given for free to one private industry for their private profit.