By Christine Mui and Jun Li

Outdoor dining in Boston has flourished during the last few weeks despite COVID-19 rates steadily rising, but one neighborhood seems to have been left behind. Restaurants in Chinatown, where the pandemic’s economic impacts hit first and hard, have stayed reluctant to make the switch to outdoor dining, choosing to stick to takeout only instead.

Approval for outdoor dining requires obtaining temporary extension of a premise permit from the Licensing Board for the City of Boston — a process permitted until December for outdoor dining on public property and indefinitely for private property. Yet, of the 467 restaurants in Boston currently licensed and open for outdoor dining, only nine are located in the Chinatown/Leather District, and even fewer are Chinese-owned.

The online directions, application, FAQs, and other resources are not offered in Chinese, as of October 30th. City Councilor Ed Flynn, who represents Chinatown, said the language barrier and lack of translation services may have played a role in fewer applications from Chinese restaurant owners. “Language access is also an ongoing challenge,” he said. “But the City of Boston needs to do a better job of providing language access to residents who speak Cantonese, and that’s my top priority.”

For most restaurants, the lack of preexisting outdoor dining infrastructure and experience also contributed to their reluctance to apply for a permit. Steve Clark, vice president of government affairs at the Massachusetts Restaurant Association, explained that “to begin with, a very small percentage of restaurants actually had outdoor dining available prior to the pandemic. Many had to build up from scratch.” Even those restaurants previously approved for outdoor dining required new licenses amidst COVID-19.

Clark added it is unlikely that delayed permits were the reason for the lower prevalence of outdoor dining in Chinatown, as “the City has been really active in getting permits distributed.” However, he speculated that there could have been “possibly a delay in updating websites or how the website search function works, but I can’t say whether that is true or not.”

A decline in clientele, due to racist misconceptions about COVID-19’s transmission, is another hurdle for restaurant owners deciding whether to expand beyond takeout. According to Councilor Flynn, tourism has been nearly non-existent. “I do see more people going back to Chinatown, but you know, it’s been a very difficult road for our restaurants in Chinatown,” he said. “I’ve noticed significant anti-Asian sentiment throughout the country — bullying, intimidation of the Asian community.”

Although COVID-19 caused Chinatown’s Q Restaurant to close for two months before reopening for indoor-dining and takeout options, its general manager Billy Gu found that since restrictions have eased, they’re doing “much better than anticipated,” thanks to their loyal customer base.

“We reopened one month for takeout, and after that, it’s been getting better than worse,” Gu said. “[It’s] nothing compared to what we used to do, but given the fact that it’s during the pandemic, I am definitely not complaining about what we do right now.”

Compared to other Boston neighborhoods, Chinatown is much more tightly packed, with its narrower streets rarely allowing for the extension of public outdoor dining setups into the sidewalks or roads. “Outdoor dining costs money, and if an operator is surviving with takeout and delivery, they may not think it is worth the investment to expand outdoors,” Clark said. “Space is needed for outdoor dining, and it is possible that the space available was not conducive to running a restaurant operation.”

When Councilor Flynn reached out to Chinatown’s restaurant owners, “many of them declined, going forward with any plan to open up their restaurant without outdoor seating.” He recalled helping only one individual with applying for the outdoor dining permit, sharing that for the most part, owners weren’t seeking one as “they didn’t think it would be helpful or successful.”

Gu, too, ultimately decided not to pursue a permit application for his restaurant, considering it would not be able to serve hotpot, one of their primary menu offerings, outdoors. “[For] the neighborhood, plus the area that we are able to do, we can’t really do outdoor dining [there] for our cuisine,” he said.

In the meanwhile, recovery for the restaurant industry remains a waiting game. “Obviously, the pandemic numbers are still skyrocketing,” said Councilor Flynn. “But at the appropriate time, I want to make sure that we invite residents and tourists back to Chinatown.”

To read this article in Chinese (Traditional), please click here.