Illinois Restaurants Struggle For Survival: Group

ELMHURST, IL — Nearly 60 percent of restaurant operators expect to be out of business in six months, absent a return to indoor dining and a federal relief package, an industry official said Tuesday.

The Illinois Restaurant Association recently surveyed its members about the state of their businesses in the pandemic, said Sam Toia, the group's president and CEO.

According to the survey, 86 percent of restaurant operators laid off or furloughed employees this year. That same percentage reported they would make no profit in 2020, Toia said in an interview with Patch.

Restaurants, he said, have seen their income drop anywhere from 50 percent to 80 percent from a year ago.

In late October, Gov. J.B. Pritzker banned indoor dining in the Chicago area because of a surge in coronavirus cases. By early November, he extended the prohibition through the entire state. A similar ban took place in the spring.

While some restaurants in the suburbs and elsewhere are violating the indoor dining ban, Toia said his group "strongly advocates" that no member disobey it.

At the same time, the association wants the ban loosened. While Toia said his group opposes a 100 percent return to indoor dining for the time being, it does not understand why no such service is allowed. Toia referred to a university study that showed that indoor dining could safely be allowed at 20 percent of capacity.

"We know how to do this right," Toia said. "We are a highly regulated industry. There should be limited indoor dining."

He said the expected return of the Payment Protection Program, or PPP, will help restaurants survive. He also said his group favored the proposed Restaurants Act, which would provide federal relief similar to what the car and banking industries received more than a decade ago.

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Such measures are especially important, he said, because the restaurant and hospitality industry is the No 1 private sector employer in Illinois and No. 2 nationwide.

"The restaurant industry has been hemorrhaging for the last 10 months," Toia said.

In a recent CBS 2 story, the Chicago Department of Health defended pandemic restrictions in response to restaurant industry criticism that the state lacks data to support the rules.

"(E)ven when restaurants and bars follow the guidelines, they are by their very nature a concern during a pandemic: it is difficult to maintain social distancing, people are talking and interacting often in close proximity to one another, and they must frequently remove their masks to eat and drink, which increases the risk of transmission," the department said in a statement. "One of the many unfortunate consequences of this pandemic has been the detrimental impact on the hospitality industry, but we are committed to continuing to work with the industry to help them weather this difficult time.”