Editorial: Stop job-killing new L.A. restaurant law

Everyone in Los Angeles County eats out — often, or from time to time.

Since the pandemic, most everyone eats in, too, occasionally — not on cuisine freshly prepared in your kitchen, but on restaurant-prepared meals delivered to your door.

We work hard at our jobs, at our schools, taking care of our families, and, as the advertising jingle used to go, You deserve a break today.

So it has not escaped your notice that the price of eating out, and in, has simply skyrocketed in the last five years.

An Angeleno reported paying $48, with tip, for a ham sandwich and an ordinary glass of wine — nothing more — at a casual new Atwater Village lunch counter last weekend.

Now, that’s eatery inflation. But it’s not as if it’s the restaurateur’s fault. She is faced with rapidly rising prices on everything from ingredients to the crazy rent. And personnel costs? No wonder many places are short-staffed.

California already exacerbated matters when the Legislature passed and the governor signed a law mandating a $20 minimum hourly wage for fast-food workers. In response, Rubio’s closed 48 restaurants in June, and Pizza Hut laid off 1,100 delivery drivers. Tens of thousands of fast-food workers in the state — not their fault; they’ll take the hourly bump — report they are now working fewer hours.

Apparently seeking to add insult to injury, Los Angeles Councilman Hugo Soto-Martínez last month introduced the so-called Fast Food Fair Work ordinance, which he says would give workers more stability and consistency in scheduling, a boost in sick time and education around their rights.

Restaurant owners, joined by the California League of United Latin American Citizens, have organized in outrage at this latest government attempt to make it almost impossible to keep the doors open. “The L.A. City Council should know that this ordinance would make it more difficult to do business in L.A. — hurting Latino small business owners the most,” says Jacob Sandoval of LULAC. With the recent 25% hike in the minimum wage, many restaurant owners are barely hanging on, says Lilly Rocha, CEO of the Latino Restaurant Association.

The full council needs to rally to save local jobs by opposing the ordinance.

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