City Safety Panel to Recommend Rules Allowing Outdoor Dining

After hearing testimony favoring outdoor dining establishments from a wide array of witnesses, South Pasadena’s Public Safety Commission promised to recommend revisions in the City Code to legally allow the popular pastime.

The commission explored the safety issue because the city believed it might be held liable if sidewalk obstructions, including tables and chairs, contributed to an accident.

Three restaurants in the city currently offer outdoor dining. Before a crowd of more than 120 people gathered in the City Council chambers, owners of the restaurants, patrons and local residents defended the safety of sidewalk dining and praised its economic and cultural benefits.

Renee Richards, manager of Buster’s, said, “There is a need in South Pasadena for what has been created at these establishments . . . a friendly environment for people to gather and feel part of a group or community.”

Richards said such cities as Pasadena, Claremont and Santa Monica have ordinances allowing outside dining and have not experienced safety problems. She said her employees are trained to keep the tables and chairs pulled back against the building and to clean the sidewalk regularly. She said that Buster’s added the city as an additional insured party to the coffeehouse’s insurance policy early this month.

The commission will take up the issue of other obstructions on city sidewalks, including clothes racks, planters and sandwich board signs, at a future meeting.

Commissioner Robert P. Lewis Jr. said in a phone interview Tuesday that it appeared to him that Buster’s and the other restaurants were making an effort to keep the sidewalks clear and to ensure that patrons displayed a proper concern for others.