Somerville restaurants upset at city’s restrictions while rest of state reopens

SOMERVILLE, Mass. — As Massachusetts moves forward in reopening with indoor dining now at full capacity, some restaurant owners in Somerville are frustrated that the city remains at a 25% limit.

“I’m done,” said Joe Cassinelli, owner of the Alpine Restaurant Group. “I’m done with the lack of communication, I’m done with not getting a reason why, and not getting a date when.”

Alpine Restaurant Group includes popular Somerville restaurants like The Painted Burro, Posto and Rosebud, all located in Davis Square.

Cassinelli said his wait staff is now leaving and heading over to cities like Boston and Cambridge where business is, more or less, back to normal.

He told Boston 25 on Friday that he blames the mayor for much of the current financial obstacles, saying the city should follow Governor Charlie Baker’s guidance.

“Every single day that goes by is just lost revenue, lost opportunity, lost chance to do what we should be able to do, which is operate our businesses.”

On Friday, Somerville Mayor Joe Curtaone pointed fingers at Baker, saying he was the one moving too fast.

“Even the governor knows that indoor dining is one of the riskiest activities for superspreaders or transmission of the virus, so I’m not just going to follow along,” he told Boston 25. “I have a responsibility to the people in my community who live or work here.”

Boston 25 asked what type of COVID-19 data the city would need to reopen at full capacity like the rest of the state, to which Mayor Curtatone said “there is no magic number.”

“Why would we want to do anything to jeopardize everything we’ve gone through and then put us in a worse situation?”

Cassinelli said he is also frustrated because he started building an outdoor patio on Monday, only to have the city shut down construction on Thursday for not having updated permits.

The mayor argued that it was a safety issue.

“Anyone who has built something or made an improvement to a home knows you have to have sign-off from the inspectional service division, from engineering, we need to make sure that what you’re constructing is safe,” he said.

One reason Curtatone offered as to why Somerville restaurants are still struggling, is because he does not believe people feel safe going out to eat.

“What we hear from the majority of people is – the reason they don’t have a lot of customers is because consumer confidence is down because people don’t feel safe, because inherently we know that is a risky activity,” he said.

Somerville’s current reopening phase is scheduled to last through at least Monday, March 15.

Boston 25 asked the mayor about any possible changes to those 25% capacity limit, and he said he did not foresee any changes.

“I’d say for the next 30 days as we’re hearing from experts either directly or from their issued reports, we’re going to see where we are with the variants as I’m sure every municipality and hopefully the state will, and where we are in terms of the vaccine,” he said.

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