‘Everything was so much better’

Alejandra Salcido, a server at Vinoteca Di Monica in the bustling North End, is constantly on the move.

Salcido has served at the popular Italian eatery for three years to help her afford higher education. She looks forward to the warmer months, but often reminisces about her first summer at the restaurant.

“It is a huge difference from two years ago when we had the outdoor patio,” Salcido told the Herald during the Friday lunch rush.

Outdoor dining is not coming back to Vinoteca Di Monica this year — a trend that started in 2023 while nearly every other neighborhood in the city provided a full-scale al fresco option to patrons.

Officials have limited outdoor dining in the Italian neighborhood to just “compliant sidewalk patios,” but due to the narrow sidewalk in front of the Vinoteca Di Monica, the option is off the table.

The restaurant Salcido works at is at the center of a lawsuit that owner Jorge Mendoza-Iturralde and 20 other restaurateurs, along with the North End Chamber of Commerce, filed in federal court earlier this year, accusing Mayor Michelle Wu of “discriminatory bias.”

“It’s something unfair. It impacts a lot,” Salcido said. “All of us think the same: We want the patios back. It’s something that we need.”

“It’s still a really good place to work,” she added. “The North End is always busy, especially in the summer, but obviously it was different in the summer when we had the patios. We got more people, we got more tables, and of course, more money. Everything was so much better.”

The plaintiffs amended the lawsuit this week, adding in the losses they anticipate they’ll encounter in 2024, the fees they paid in 2022 and the lost revenue from 2023. In total, they say they’re seeking millions in damages.

The restrictions affect restaurateurs economically as indoor seats lose value on sunny days in the spring and summer, and they’re losing out on extra revenue “to compensate for the losses of the winter,” Mendoza-Iturralde told the Herald on Thursday.

“Mayor Wu has no right to do what she’s doing to us,” the restaurateur said during a Friday protest. “We are being put at a huge disadvantage. It affects people from all communities. It affects all the people who come to work here. It affects what we can put on the table. It affects how we pay our mortgages, our rents and taxes.”

At an unrelated event Friday, Wu highlighted how outdoor dining allowed some North End restaurants to double their capacity, doubling their revenue from the additional meals. But she said the businesses have remained busy even with limited outdoor dining.

“We haven’t seen restaurants empty in the North End, for example,” the mayor said. “Sure, they may not be at the doubling of their capacity as it was during the emergency pandemic when they shut down the inside and therefore they needed some outside seats.

“I’m a firm believer of outdoor dining,” she added. “I think every way that we can get people out of their homes, into our streets and in the community, it’s good for small businesses, it’s good for the city, it’s good for our communities but it has to work with neighbors, residents and the flow of traffic.”