Rehoboth restaurants will have to pay to use outdoor dining barricades next year
Shannon Marvel McNaughtREHOBOTH BEACH — Should pandemic restrictions continue, Rehoboth Beach will charge downtown restaurants to utilize required barricades for outdoor dining.
The city first installed the barricades along the first two blocks of Rehoboth Avenue in May to encourage social distancing among pedestrians. Later, the barricades were pared down to only in front of restaurants that had added sidewalk dining. They were removed entirely in November, after tourist season ended.
Rehoboth Beach spokeswoman Krys Johnson said 11 restaurants utilized a total of about 150 barricades this year, provided for free by the city. The city purchased 50 of the barricades midsummer for $300 apiece, but continued to rent the rest from Suburban Propane at a cost of $15 per barricade, per month, according to City Manager Sharon Lynn.
Now, the city is looking to recoup some of that money. Should the governor's state of emergency restrictions continue into spring 2021, downtown Rehoboth restaurants will have to pay to use the barricades.
Mayor Stan Mills said at a Nov. 10 meeting he believes it’s a reasonable request, since the city is providing the labor and signage, as well as absorbing the estimated $4,000 in revenue loss for each parking space blocked by the barricades.
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Restaurants will be expected to pay the same price the city pays to rent the barricades, a price which is expected to rise next year to about $20 per barricade, per month, according to Johnson. The number of barricades a restaurant requires varies.
Rehoboth Beach-Dewey Beach Chamber of Commerce President Carol Everhart said restaurants were expecting the expense and she doesn't anticipate any problems.
She surveyed 46 of downtown Rehoboth’s 72 sit-down eateries in October. Forty-three of those restaurants said they wanted to continue with outdoor dining, even at a cost, according to Everhart.
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“They’re in a situation where the outdoor dining really saved them. They may not have made money, but they didn’t have to close their doors,” Everhart said. “My takeaway was ... it’s worth their while.”
Yolanda Pineda owns Mariachi Restaurant on the beach block of Wilmington Avenue, which utilized the barricades over the summer. She was relieved to hear the city wouldn’t be asking restaurants to reimburse them for lost parking revenue and said $20 per barricade was reasonable.
“We need to do this together. We have to figure out how to have outdoor seating and the city can make money too," Pineda said. "I understand, the city has to pay people too.”
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