Santa Monica has spent years discussing economic recovery, support for local businesses, and revitalizing the Pier. Yet one of the Pier’s largest restaurant spaces continues to sit vacant while a project capable of creating more than 50 jobs remains at a standstill.
My name is Sean Ahaus, founder of California Roadhouse, Inc. For more than a year, we have worked with the City of Santa Monica to open a new California-themed restaurant and live music venue at 256 Santa Monica Pier. We remain ready to invest, hire, and open our doors. The remaining obstacle is not financing, construction, or our willingness to move forward. It is an unresolved dispute over labor-related provisions in the City’s proposed lease.
We believe those provisions go beyond the City’s traditional role as a landlord and instead attempt to regulate aspects of the employer-employee relationship that are governed by state and federal labor law. Whether people ultimately agree with our legal position or not, the public deserves to know why these issues have prevented a major public property from reopening…