Restaurants are struggling immensely right now, and one local group will be giving out grants to help businesses with their expenses, hopefully avoiding more permanent closures. The grants will come from the Milwaukee Independent Restaurant Coalition (MIRC), a group that formed earlier this year to support locally owned restaurants and service industry employees during the pandemic. The group has about 90 restaurant members so far.
Each microgrant will be $1,000 and awarded randomly to qualifying restaurants that apply. In order to qualify, a restaurant just needs to be a MIRC member, which is free, be located in Milwaukee County, and be independently owned. The group will use a randomizer to choose the grant recipients from the pool of applicants.
MIRC will award 10 of the grants on September 7. They plan to continue to award more $1,000 grants once their relief fund reaches $10,000. Unlike money from the Paycheck Protection Program and other government funds, there are no restrictions on how the grant money can be used. The grant money is raised by MIRC in one of two ways. The first is direct donations to their relief fund. The second is through MIRC-branded merchandise, which is where you come in. Many people are wondering what they can do, besides going out to eat, to support our local restaurants, and this is a direct way to do it. You can buy t-shirts, hats, masks and a few other things on their website, and your money will go directly to funding their relief grants.
First Mask Violations Issued
The City of Milwaukee recently released information about mask mandate enforcement and violations. The ordinance, which went into effect in July, requires anyone over the age of 3 to wear a mask indoors or within 6 feet of other people outside. It’s being enforced by the city’s health department, so the onus is on businesses to ensure their patrons comply with the mandate, or risk getting cited, fined, or even have their licenses revoked in extreme cases.
Because of how enforcement was set up, it’s interesting to see which businesses are being cited for violations. As of August 18, there were 18 businesses cited or fined by the health department. The majority of the violators are not restaurants but do include grocery stores and convenience stores that also sell prepared foods. There are a couple fast food locations, gas stations, a post office, and amusingly enough, a strip club.
Only one business had been fined as of August 18th, and it’s a restaurant: Fiesta Cafe. They received a total of three citations of $500 each on August 5. According to a Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article, an employee stated the citations were issued as a result of customers not wearing masks while at the restaurant’s outdoor bar area.
James Beard Awards Canceled
And finally in restaurant news this week, the James Beard Foundation announced that they were canceling their awards this year.
The Beard Awards are often described as the Oscars of the service industry, and were supposed to be held in Chicago in spring this year. The awards ceremony was initially postponed until September and was going to be virtual, but JBF released a statement explaining that the remaining winners will not be announced at all, effectively cancelling the awards this year. According to the press release: “The choice comes as restaurants continue to suffer the grave negative effects of COVID-19, and as substantial and sustained upheaval in the community has created an environment in which the Foundation believes the assignment of Awards will do little to further the industry in its current uphill battle.”
It’s likely a sad time for the JBFA finalists, including Paul Bartolotta who was up for Outstanding Restaurateur, but this is the correct decision. Between the pandemic and its economic effect, and the social justice movement, this is not the time to put the old guard, not-accessible-to-everyone restaurants up on a pedestal while thousands of other restaurants struggle to keep their doors open.
To read more New Restaurant Reality columns by Lacey Muszynski, click here.
