Coronavirus Woes Close Decades-Old Diner In Brooklyn

BROOKLYN, NY — An iconic Dekalb Avenue diner could be the latest restaurant casualty to the coronavirus crisis.

Mega Bites diner — which has sat near Vanderbilt Avenue for decades — announced on Christmas Eve that it would be closing indefinitely after holding out hope for the recently-passed federal relief package or a rent break.

"We hoped this next COVID 19 relief bill would have provided some MEANINGFUL NON LOAN assistance for restaurants and other small businesses but unfortunately it does not. We've also hoped that our landlord would have accepted a significant reduction in rent but he has not," the restaurant wrote on its Facebook page.

"Given the significant drop in business due to the pandemic, we have been losing money since March and we can no longer continue to financially support this business under the false promise of 'help' being 'right around the corner.'"

The $900-billion relief package includes a re-start of the Paycheck Protection Program, or the loan program meant to help small businesses, but Mega Bites is not alone in its critique that the loans will not be enough to save the restaurant industry.

The diner is also among a large swath of New York City restaurant struggling with rent. A whopping 88 percent of the city's eateries couldn't pay their full rent in October, according to a study.

Like many restaurants, the diner, a Black-owned business, had started a GoFundMe over the summer.

"Owning While Black is a 'thing,'" owners wrote at the time. "Any monies raised will be used to help offset not only the obvious drop in business but the not-so-obvious additional costs incurred because racism is truly systemic and expensive for black business to defend against."

The fundraiser, which is still active, raised about $4,000 of its $100,000 goal.