Pizza Today - March 2022 - 46

be required. This in turn allows your
contractor to be able to put together
an accurate bid for the project.
At this stage, it is important to
be able to " sell " the officials on the
value of your restaurant and how it
will contribute to the neighborhood
and city overall by bringing jobs,
additional tax revenue and attracting
new residents and visitors, etc. Some
jurisdictions want to attract new
businesses; unfortunately, some others
seem to not care all that much.
Oftentimes, the bureaucracy
is slow-moving and can create
high barriers to entry. If this is the
case in your project, it can be helpful
to hire a land-use attorney who can
negotiate with officials to reduce
some of the more arduous requirements
and speed up the process. The
attorney can even challenge the
official's interpretation of the code.
For example, in my own restaurant,
the code said that certain types of
government reviews of the project
were only required if there was a
" change of use " in the building. As
I was remodeling an existing restaurant,
there was no change of use,
however, a county official tried to say
that a " change in cuisine " was considered
a change of use. This misinterpretation
would have cost my business
hundreds of thousands of dollars
and months if not years of delays.
However, after hiring outside counsel
and involving my local elected official
to put pressure on the various county
departments, they approved our plans
and allowed us to open immediately.
Like with contractors, hiring an
attorney who has relationships with
the city officials is important, as they
will know how to work with them
efficiently. Further, it can also be
helpful to involve your elected official's
office if the jurisdiction is being
46 / PIZZATODAY.COM / MARCH 2022
difficult, as they can place political
pressure on bureaucrats.
Once an entrepreneur is finally
able to obtain the appropriate
permits and licenses, the two most
common regulatory issues operators
face are with their local health
department and with state and federal
employee laws.
Once your plans are approved,
you must submit these plans to the
local health department to obtain a
restaurant permit. Again, if your contractor
and architect have designed
restaurants previously, they will know
the various requirements that your
particular jurisdiction has. Like with
the building department, it may be
helpful to schedule a pre-application
meeting with the health department
to ensure your plans can meet their
requirements.
Even if you have the cleanest
kitchen in town, just about every
operator's heart sinks when a health
inspector walks into their restaurant.
Health department regulations can
vary widely and enforcement can
seem to be subjective based on which
inspector shows up at your restaurant.
Getting to know your local inspector
can be very helpful, because you then
know what their points of emphasis
are in their inspection and can train
your employees accordingly. For
example, at one of my restaurants, the
inspector always wants our dishes to
be stacked and stored a certain way,
so we train our employees to do it
that particular way.
Employee labor and workplace
safety laws are of vital importance
in the restaurant industry.
First, it is important to create an
employee handbook that creates
various policies and procedures,
including, but not limited to, safety,
anti-harassment, time-keeping, dress
code, ownership of tips and drug and
alcohol policies. This is the ultimate
guidebook for employee standards of
behavior and will be extremely valuable
when a dispute arises with an
employee. It is highly recommended
to work with a labor attorney to
create an employee handbook, as the
handbook should be tailored to state
and federal regulations that are
updated frequently by various agencies.
Your worker's compensation
insurance carrier may also have templates
for workplace safety policies
that you can use.
Additionally, laws related to minimum
wage, overtime and ownership
of tips are extremely important with
which to be familiar. Businesses are
often fined hefty penalties for failing
to pay their employees minimum
wage or in accordance with a payroll
schedule, improperly distributing
credit card or cash tips, or simply
failing to keep timecards and other
employee records. Again, working
with a competent labor attorney will
help you craft policies that are compliant
with state and federal laws.
These are just a few of the regulatory
issues that with which restaurants
can be faced. Working with
competent attorneys who are well
versed in land use, labor and corporate
governance is a worthy investment
to help the business run
efficiently, avoid costly audits and
fines and ultimately give entrepreneurs
the freedom to focus on operations
and not regulation. n
THOMAS REINHARD is a Seattlebased
business attorney and a co-owner of
Cascadia Pizza Co.
http://www.PIZZATODAY.COM
Pizza Today - March 2022

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pizza Today - March 2022
