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C i n e m a p o l i s jo i n e d i n s e n d i n g a m e s s ag e t o t h e c om m u n i t y du r i n g i t s e x t e n d e d c l o s i n g . (Photo by Casey Martin)

Businesses and workers desperate for assistance after COVID-19

By Matt Butler T he rise of COVID-19 around the United States has been an incredible, fearsome thing to watch. It has laid bare some of the structural issues in America that impact vulnerable people every day, but which only seem to generate real outrage when they begin to reach beyond those demographics.

Locally, plenty of people were already worried about what the underlying impacts of the virus would be on the Tompkins County economy, particularly with the closing of Cornell University and Ithaca College, both of which are now encouraging students to remain off-campus for the rest of the semester. Then over the last several days a series of announcements dealt serious blows to a variety of local hospitality and entertainment businesses: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued guidelines discouraging gatherings over 50 people until May 11; then Governor Andrew Cuomo asked non-essential businesses to voluntarily close; then Cuomo returned the next day to announce a tri-state agreement with New Jersey and Connecticut that would close all restaurants, bars and other nonessential businesses likely to gather large crowds (a step that both Ithaca Mayor Svante Myrick and Tompkins County Administrator Jason Molino said they had not considered enacting themselves); then President Donald Trump took to national television to advise that people refrain from gathering in crowds larger than 10. With bars closed entirely, bartenders are out of all hours, and the restrictions on restaurant mean they’ll likely start cutting worker hours if they haven’t already . While these closures are certainly prudent and do serve the public interest, that does very little to calm the fact that many of those workers will now face mounting bills with substantially less income, if any, to pay them with.

“It is smart to do the right things for public health, that includes social distancing, and if that includes shutting down bars and restaurants and that’s what the experts tell us, then that’s what we should do,” Mayor Svante Myrick said. Since Cornell closed its doors earlier this month, Myrick has called for an immediate temporary stimulus to individuals to get people and businesses through the normally prosperous but suddenly barren spring months. Those calls only intensified with the recent string of announcements. “But we have to be very aware that we’re creating an enormous hardship for a lot of people. There are a lot of people who work in those bars and restaurants, and they’ll not have enough cash to last a week, much less three months. [...] We need a direct stimulus now, we need checks cut and put into people’s pockets ASAP.”

The entertainment industry will also face a significant downturn, primarily as a result of the gathering rule. Prominent local promoter Dan Smalls spent most of last week cancelling shows and only re-booking a few, while the State Theatre’s Doug Levine told the Ithaca Times that they are canceling all shows for the next several weeks and even beyond that.

“All of our shows are wiped out at least through the end of April, and probably longer,” Levine said. “That’s obvious that it has a direct impact on my staff and the entire behind-the-scenes team. [...] The other thing that worries me is the impact on people’s, like, mental sanity. Many people come to, especially the State Theatre, to escape for a few hours. [...] I do fear that people are going to lose that escape.” It’s inevitably going to present some rather difficult decisions for those venues in terms of how much staff they can justifiably keep employed and who can remain on payroll while expected income is fully halted.

“Many hard decisions are being forced upon us,” Levine acknowledged, though he declined to talk about the State staff specifically.

It’s equally complex, if not more so, for people who earn wages mostly through tips, like the aforementioned service workers and bartenders, and the people who employ them. Kate Conroy, the owner of the Rhine House bar on West State Street, had already made the decision to close their doors before the ban closing had been announced by the state.

“Some people were nervous, some people weren’t, but we felt like we were contributing to a larger problem,” owner Kate Conroy said. “I’m glad that it’s becoming a wider thing now, because I do think it’s necessary, definitely.”

But like others said: as wise as the decision might be, that doesn’t pay the bills.

“Without any help from relief funds for small businesses or for certain industries, we wouldn’t be able to stay in business, “ Conroy said. “If it went on longer than

a month, we wouldn’t be able to reopen. And for the staff too, they can’t wait [...] We’re trying to help them out right now, researching everything we can do in terms of loans and other things, but it’s significant. Small businesses are really in a tough spot.”

The other side of the equation is what will be done to help those people who are most impacted economically by the outbreak and its resulting closures. Beyond the scores of hospitality workers, Levine notes that all the staff that works at State Theatre shows or Kitchen Theatre productions or the like are all now out of work. Some might be insulated from the problems, at least initially, thanks to the very employers who had to cut their hours. Cinemapolis, for example, announced that it would be closing completely until midApril but would be paying all its workers, including hourly workers for their time during that period.

“It was the very first priority for me,” Executive Director Brett Bossard said. “We have a dedicated staff, we’re a living wage employer, and we have people with families that depend on the stability of our business to maintain the stability of their homes. That was the first part of any decision was making sure that that was going to happen. We’re fortunate that we’ve got a supportive community, and already we’ve seen donations pouring in from new members and current members who view us as a home away from home.”

Pete Meyers, of the Tompkins County Workers Center, praised Bossard’s decision and said he hoped to see others like it around the county by employers put into similar situations. He said he would be convening a conference call this week to try to get government officials, worker representatives and advocates all on the same page, or at least close to it. As soon as the closings were announced, Meyers said he began to hear from a steady stream of workers around the county who were either having their hours cut or their jobs eliminated entirely for the foreseeable future.

Myrick said the mission of the Economic Recovery Cabinet, which he announced last week, would be to unify some of the most significant voices in the area and make sure they could focus all of their energy. His goals, he said, would be to push for and hopefully secure “New Deal levels of intervention,” lest the virus destablize the economy worse than a decade ago.

“It’s not that the folks in this room are going to solve every problem,” Myrick said. The cabinet is made up of local government officials, the largest local banks, the Tompkins County Chamber of Commerce Tompkins County Area Development, large and small business owners, and reps from the three local colleges. “But it’s important for these people to share information and get on the same page in terms of lobbying for what we need. [...] We want to be able to lobby to include in those packages the things we actually need on the ground. Unless we take action, this recession will be worse than the one I came of age in, 10 years ago.”

Conroy said the Rhinehouse ownership is trying to help workers out right now, but that without the income from the Rhinehouse, their ability would soon be drained. The help, if it’s coming from either the fedMyrick said the city’s ability to legislate commerce is minimal, and that they wouldn’t be able to do much in the way of mandating that landlord’s reduce or stop rent collection, if that would even be possible. But there is the “power of the bullhorn” at least.

As for local landlords, many of them appear to be monitoring the situation but haven’t chosen a definitive path yet. Frost Travis, of Travis-Hyde Properties, commented that the situation was still “dynamic” and that they were trying to assess steps going forward.

“We sent out an email to our tenants detailing our efforts to keep high touch areas clean,” Travis said. “The great majority of our student tenants prefer to stay in their apartments for the rest of the semester. Tenants continue to pay rent. [...] We “As a whole, I think we are trying to understand the situation at hand and be as empathetic with everyone’s situation as possible,” Lane wrote. “The concern will come later when we are not sure if there will be any leniency for mortgage payments, utility bills, tax bills, etc.”

Grassroots efforts are also in motion aiming to put pressure on local landlords and lawmakers, currently in the form of a petition asking for a city-wide rent freeze. As of Tuesday afternoon, the petition had received 632 signatures in less than a day. The Ithaca Tenants Union and the Workers Center had been calling for eviction suspension for days prior to the state court’s decision, but will likely keep pushing for more provisions.

In the meantime workers will be the ones left holding the bag. Many have ei

The ghost town of R estaurant Row on Tuesday afternoon. (Photo by Casey Martin)

eral or state government, needs to be announced immediately, she said.

Conroy’s surely not alone, both in hoping the government steps in to provide citizens with at least stop-gap funding and fearing that, if it doesn’t, her business will be kaput by the time she’s allowed to open again. The state has already taken some action to protect tenants who may find themselves cataclysmically struggling over the next several weeks. In accordance with a state court system memo, the Tompkins County Sheriff ’s Office confirmed Monday they would be stopping eviction proceedings. NYSEG also sent out an email to all customers that they would be providing programs that could help people scared their service will lapse as a result of no payment. are all trying to do our part to slow the spread of COVID-19.”

Nathan Lyman of Ithaca Renting Company shared a letter they had recently sent all of their tenants regarding the measures they were taking to combat the spread of the disease in their apartment buildings. Primarily, the company has doubled. The letter, dated March 15, did not mention rent payments and was published before the eviction directive had been handed down by the state court system. Kayla Lane, the president of the Landlords Association of Tompkins County, said that while the eviction pauses would be a “disruption of business” (due to the eviction processes that were already in motion before the virus hit) but that like others, they’re still trying to find their way as well. ther been laid off entirely or lost a significant portion of their income, either from a primary or secondary job. Monday night, when restaurants became take-out only and bars closed, carried with it an eerie silence for both residents and the workers who would normally see a dinner time rush.

“We all had some hours and even shifts cut due to the carry-out only policy, we even had to let some people go because there wasn’t enough work to be done with the staff we had,” said Eric Zoller, a kitchen chef at Souvlaki House. “If I get laid off, I’d look around and see if there’s any other options. If nothing comes up, I’d most likely move back to California.”