Updated: COVID-19: Cold Tea Restaurant in hot water after allegedly holding New Year’s Eve bash against public health restrictions
The Granville and Davie restaurant was apparently fined for serving alcohol past 8 pm, flouting a public-health order
Cold Tea Restaurant opened during the pandemic.
B.C.’s RESTAURANT INDUSTRY was shocked and angered by Dr. Bonnie Henry’s last-minute health order prohibiting restaurants from serving alcohol past 8 pm on New Year’s Eve.
Now, a Vancouver restaurant has been identified as a place that reportedly violated the COVID-19 restriction by hosting about 100 people on December 31.
After a complaint from the public, police attended Cold Tea Restaurant (1193 Granville Street, at Davie), around 11 p.m. on December 31, according to Global News.
A private party was underway, complete with food and liquor service. Global reported that officers shut down the event and issued the owner/organizer a $2,300 fine.
Ian Tostenson, president of the B.C. Restaurant and Foodservice Association, told Global he was “disgusted” by the event.
“This industry has worked so hard to earn the right and the privilege to open up — we’re one of the only provinces that still have indoor dining,” Tostenson said. “That sort of thing is so reckless, it puts the entire industry at peril, it actually hurts our credibility with government.”
Tostenson also said the association would support harsher penalties against businesses that disregard COVID-19 rules, particularly when others are complying even though they’re struggling to survive.
“Everybody knows what you’re supposed to be doing, and it’s certainly not having a party on New Year’s Eve with 100 people,” Tostenson said. “You’re living on another planet somewhere if you didn’t know those are the rules.”
Cold Tea Restaurant opened this past May, serving modern Chinese and Vietnamese fare and all-day dim sum.
Update
Cold Tea co-owner Ron Cheng has apologized and taken responsibility for serving alcohol past 8 p.m. on New Year’s Eve. However, he said that other information that police shared was inaccurate.
“It wasn’t an event, it was a dinner,” Cheng told Global News on January 4. “It wasn’t 100 people, it was 38 people seated down for dinner. This dinner was planned two or three months in advance before any of these new regulations were in place,”
He said the restaurant had already purchased all the food and alcohol for the function. The decision to proceed was fuelled by the the fact that Cold Tea is a new business and as a result does not qualify for government assistance related to COVID-19. At the end of an already difficult year, the team went ahead in an effort to keep the business going.
“I’m not justifying what we did was right, I take responsibility for it” Cheng said. “But also, at the same time.. our backs were against the wall as a new business and survival instincts kicked in.”
Cheng also noted that comments with “racist and violent undertones” have been directed toward the business on social media, and someone had thrown eggs at the restaurant’s windows.
“Each owner has invested their life savings into this,” he said. “There’s four of us and we put everything we had into it and we’re still putting everything we have into it.”
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