Edhat Staff
The owners of a downtown restaurant are stating the City of Santa Barbara ordered them to remove their outdoor dining area within days.
The Daisy restaurant, located at 1221 State Street, has a handful of picnic tables and yellow umbrellas next to the large wooden structure for the Arigato sushi restaurant parklet.
A few months ago the Santa Barbara City Council voted on several changes to the State Street Promenade that included the addition of a central bike lane, and one lane of traffic in the 1200 block to allow for vehicle drop-offs in front of the Granada Theatre.
The owners of The Daisy, Dominic Shiach and Carmen “Daisy” DeForest, posted on social media that they received a notice on November 9 to completely remove their outdoor dining area by November 12.
If the restaurant did not comply, the city would charge the owners and remove their property for them.
“The City of Santa Barbara, in their great wisdom, concern and thoughtfulness for the small business, gave us notice at 4.30pm this afternoon that we have to entirely remove our street seating by Sunday,” the owners posted on their Facebook page last week. “The preposterous and grossly unkind short notice aside, the City prefer to open the street to cars and traffic; they love big business pollutants!”
On Monday afternoon, the City issued a press release stating the State Street Promenade Bike Lanes and Crosswalks will be installed this week from Victoria to Haley Streets. Installation is scheduled to begin on Tuesday, November 14, in the 1200 block and will be completed over the next three week.
“The 1200 block will be opened to northbound vehicular traffic to facilitate passenger drop-off at the Granada Theatre,” the city states.
The public statement goes on to say that State Street is a “City Council-designated High Priority Vision Zero Corridor” aimed to eliminate severe traffic-related injuries and fatalities.
To limit potential collisions between cyclists and pedestrians on the promenade, and with vehicles at intersections, the City Council requested this pilot project. High-visibility crosswalks will also be installed at mid-blocks and intersections.
Pilot projects are a way to experiment with different configurations downtown before significant investment into a permanent solution occurs, the city states.
Even if you believe the restaurant should be moved out of the street, the timing of the notice was completely unreasonable. To expect anyone to be able to hire workers, obtain storage space for the removed items and accomplish that after normal week day working hours is illogical. And we always refer to actions like this as “The City” did so and so. But in actuality it was one or a few City employees. And on top of all of this panic street painting will be unlikely later this week with the heavy rain predicted. I hope more logical minds at “The City” intervene and work out a logical path forward.
here is an idea then….don’t encroach on public land when you’re lease is within a confined area, stay within that confined zone. Problem solved. Or is that too simple?
I am all for removing all of the so-called “parklets.” But let’s do it in a fair and organized manner. Two days notice at 4:30 on a Friday before a holiday isn’t logical and only adds to the current muddled situation.
you’re acting like Veterans day is like Christmas. People do not go out on Veterans Day and shop and dine because it’s Veterans Day. Nor do most consider it a “Holiday Weekend”. Daisey knew this was coming. All of us do that work downtown. We all receive letters and updates and communications from the City. These guys just want their cake and eat it too. It would have been best for them just to keep their furniture inside.
If you read the article, they did not know it was coming, and the issue with the “holiday weekend” was that the city was closed. You sound like a a disgruntled ex-employee.
just laying down facts that most of you can’t seem to grasp. not disgruntled at all. quite amused actually.
What facts? You were wrong about encroaching, you were wrong about there not being a lease, you were wrong about them getting advanced notice, you were wrong about Veterans Day not being a holiday with the city closed. What “facts” were you “laying down”?
VOR, i’m wrong? How so? because you said so? I actually said, “you’re acting like Veterans day is like Christmas. People do not go out on Veterans Day and shop and dine because it’s Veterans Day. Nor do most consider it a “Holiday Weekend”.”
Not as you misquoted me. Facts are facts. If you love the daisey so much, why don’t you dine there often? 30 tables and chairs on the street and they are crying because they have to move them. Their lease dosn’t go into the street, which is public. Their lease is within the confines of the physical street number and honestly, i’m by there often. They don’t need 30 tables and chairs outside or inside, maybe 10 at the most.
I’ve presented facts, objections, reality. You have just jumped on board to argue…with nothing?
They had a lease with the city. Every restaurant on State with a parklet / outdoor seating has one.
VOICE – what does the city being closed on Veterans Day have to do with any of this? They didn’t need the city to be open to comply with the notice, they just had to move their stuff from where it wasn’t allowed. It would take half a day at most.
Were any other businesses in the area given this same notice?
So, what makes this business so special? Was no one else required to move their things? Sorry, I just don’t see what the outrage is.
Sac, you are seeing it for what it is man. Nothing. There is absolutely nothing special about the place. I’ve ate there several times (mostly to go at the office). It’s mediocre. This is just a bunch of people jumping on the bandwagon to cry and complain with others about nothing that effects them…at all. Its also a little obnoxious that they want to play victim here when they are one of the reasons we don’t have our road open. So places like theirs can dream of filling 60 tables with half of them in the gutter. Fine dining at it’s best in SB. These guys are lucky to have 15 people at once in there. 30 is laughable. This isn’t Joes or the Palace
Presumably, the ability to negotiate with the city on timing, discuss alternative options.
VOICE – you cry about deleted comments, yet you insist on trolling, insulting and just being in general condescending to all. What is wrong with you? No self awareness at all…..
Oh, maybe that’s why you’ve been commenting here all along as “anonymous.” You knew no one would engage had they known it was our king troll. Ok, makes sense, but didn’t work.
Thanks mm1970, the basics can be tough for Sac.
You know not of what you speak.
I mean… City Council meetings, agendas, etc are public, I would think you would be keeping up with downtown happenings if you had a business there. It’s well-known that plans for that area have been up in the air as of late.
“Up in the air”, yes exactly, which is why a notice at 4:30pm before a holiday weekend was a surprise.
Does anyone accept that they are part of the greater community? Or is it only about your personal choices and interests. I am disappointed in the owners of this restaurant who have been camping on public space for years complaining that they can’t do it anymore. I do agree that others have gotten away with this and will apparently continue to get away with it for some time but that doesn’t make it right. Basically this is squatting. One has to assume that the business was originally penciled out as a profit without this additional space. They should make it on the original business plan, change the costs to make a profit or move on.
You rock RHS
They had a lease agreement with the city so your squatting / camping on public space comment is badly misplaced. They also aren’t complaining they can’t use the space anymore, their complaining about the abrupt nature of the lease termination with no prior discussion and 48 hours notice given at 4:30 pm ahead of a holiday weekend. I’m sure you’d be singing a different tune if their private landlord did the same with their lease that the city did with its lease.
when you’re squatting on public land, you’re lucky to get 48 hours notice. There is no “lease agreement” with the city and certainly nothing legally binding. You’re trying, so we’ll give you points for effort.
Karma, you are absolutely wrong. Each parklet or outdoor seating area on the sidewalk or street has an agreement with the city in place.
not all of them. this is fact. many of them do and good for them, but i know, for a fact that many do not.
RHS, thank you. Our offices are near Carrillo on State. A few diners holding the street hostage and complaining when they are told to move their junky parklets.
Those diners were all perfectly fine operating in doors prior to Covid lockdown. We gave them a few inches and look whats happened. Randy and Eric seem to be the only ones that don’t want to destroy downtown further. This city council is the absolute worst I’ve seen since 1982.
The Daisy didn’t have a parklet.
exactly, which is why them crying and stomping their feet because they had to move their furniture inside, is a bit over the top and enough for me not to order from them again.
Crying and stomping their feet? You’re making a bigger deal over this article than the Daisy did over the sudden seating removal.
not really, ‘anon’. not really at all. considering the amount of publicity they are getting for crying.
I am guessing that they knew before now that their parklet was going to need removing
This is a tangent, but does the “Vision Zero” moniker bother anyone else? I do know what it refers to, but it sounds like blindness to me.
Does Arigato and the Sportsmen have to move their parklets too? It’s right next to the Daisey’s.
actually Sports is across the street and not near the defunct crosswalk
Does sitting in the gutter enhance one’s fine dining experience? It seems that this eatery doesn’t even have a raised platform to keep patrons off the asphalt and out of contact with the gutter. The picnic benches are resting directly on the pavement. Doesn’t this dining setup bother anybody who is concerned about keeping things sanitary?
I agree. I won’t sit in a parking lot or street to eat.
trash. keep cars off state street
no, no thanks and unless you actually have a business on state street, that opinion matters not.
My experience as a down town business owner is the city does whatever it wants. The city owned trees that I would be in HUGE trouble for cutting down caused $30,000 in sewer repair to root infested pipes from those trees and we have constant leaf maintenance now for athestics and flood control from leaf accumulation on our roof/guttrrs. I love trees but if they are city planted they are owned by the city and they should pay for any damages
The restaurant didn’t even have a “parklet” structure. Just some picnic tables, heaters, and plants. Probably took them an hour to move them out of the way.
Nice looking parklet. If they need to have traffic open for drop offs, make it one way, take out the bike lane.