COVID-19 concerns cause stark changes for restaurants

Employees say they've never seen anything like this.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WLNE) — Capital Grille is following Governor Raimondo’s new rule limiting restaurants to 100 guests at a time, and Saturday night it was turning away people who didn’t have reservations.

“I think the establishments should put something on their website if they’re going to limit the capacity,” said Dean Thibault of Mendon, “because we did go on their website 10 minutes before we drove down here, and it mentioned nothing about that.”

Other restaurants downtown wish they had that problem.

With events canceled, restaurants like Bravo Brasserie are seeing customers stay away.

“It’s been a crushing impact,” said Bravo’s manager, Tim Cleland. “We are a theatre-driven restaurant. With no performances going on at Trinity Rep or PPAC, our reservations are significantly down.”

He says he understands why officials are making this decision, but says it’s unsustainable for many in the service industry.

“The livelihood of everyone here as well as everyone in the area has been drastically affected,” Cleland said. “Moving forward, everything is contingent upon being legally allowed to assemble more than 100 people.”

That’s why some loyal customers say healthy people should stay aware, but not live in fear.

“A small little bug that you can’t even see has brought this world to its knees,” said Lisa Cournoyer Mongeau of Providence. “And to realize how precious life is, and it can change at the drop of a hat.”

Restaurants like Bravo say they are now forced to reduce their hours in response to the COVID-19 crisis.