Restaurateur Faces Backlash After 'Safe Harbor' Offer To Police

NEW PORT RICHEY, FLA – Ron Pentaude never imagined the backlash he would face when he declared his Local Fresh Grill restaurant a "safe harbor" for police officers last week.

But after posting a sign that includes the image of a gold police badge next to the door of his healthy food eatery Thursday, Pentaude says he has received a host of social media abuse and a threat that his restaurant would be burned to the ground — all because of his loyalty to law enforcement.

Pentaude, a 61-year-old Navy veteran, told Patch on Monday that he didn't expect the heated response to the sign, which he posted after his own frustrations grew with the movement by protesters to disband and defund law enforcement agencies since the death of George Floyd while in custody of Minneapolis police officers.

“The first day it was just venting,” Pentaude said of his reasoning for hanging the sign in the window of his restaurant, which he has owned for nearly four years. “But (opponents) came back so nasty that it went it from a vent to a movement.

“I’m just tired of people tearing my country apart. We really have to get sanity back into our country.”

Pentaude has also made his feelings known on Facebook, where he posted that his restaurant will always have officers’ backs and said he will allow officers to enter his establishment and lock the doors if needed to protect officers. He said the protection also extends to “everyone out there. Black, white, or any other color. If you need us, we are there.”

After a wealth of comments opposing Pentaude’s beliefs found their way onto Local Fresh Grill’s Facebook page, the restaurateur filed paperwork for a not-for-profit that includes the website, www.wesupportlawenforcement.org on Thursday night. Since then, Pentaude says he has received $2,000 in donations to show support for and help feed local police officers.

Before Thursday, he said, Local Fresh Grill would get perhaps one police officer in per day even though the restaurant is a short distance from the police department and county sheriff’s department. The restaurant is closed on weekends, but Pentaude said he had seen a lot of new faces in the eatery already on Monday, when employees told him the restaurant was “slammed.”

Pentaude says the reaction to the signage has awakened “a sleeping giant” and that because of the opposition, the response has caused him to dig in his heels even more. While much of the backlash has come over social media, Pentaude says he has received a couple of phone calls, including one that included the threat to burn his restaurant down.

Pentaude said he had no idea of the tenor of the messages on the restaurant’s Facebook page until the person who handles advertising for the business called and alerted him to what was being said. The Navy veteran said he has had discussions with some of his fellow veterans about their feelings about the attention being directed at law enforcement and how they could get involved in the fight.

“I guess I found my something we can do for me,” he said. “It was all by accident, but they woke the sleeping giant, and now it’s like, ‘OK, now you’ve given me a cause to latch onto.’"