{"id":5408,"date":"2009-09-14T12:56:30","date_gmt":"2009-09-14T17:56:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=5408"},"modified":"2009-09-14T12:57:32","modified_gmt":"2009-09-14T17:57:32","slug":"russos-rebellion-scores-a-victory","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/?p=5408","title":{"rendered":"Russo’s Rebellion Scores A Victory"},"content":{"rendered":"

A couple of weeks back we noted<\/a> Chef Lenny Russo’s urgent complaint about an impending Saint Paul city ordinance related to restaurants. Russo was so alarmed by the ordinance that he announced plans to move his restaurant out of the city.<\/p>\n

This weekend, Russo posted an update<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A lot of people in both Minneapolis and St. Paul have been watching as those of us in the St. Paul hospitality industry have been working toward defeating a proposal by St. Paul City Council Person Melvin Carter III that would, among other things, require all restaurants and caterers to maintain and provide for their guests upon demand an allergen handbook listing all of the ingredients in each and every dish they serve.<\/p>\n

Some weeks back, I blogged about this and about how such an ordinance would inevitably drive our restaurant, Heartland, from the environs of St. Paul. I also gave an interview on that topic to Patrick Reusse for his KSTP AM radio show. Soon thereafter, I received an email from Council Person Carter requesting a meeting. We had that meeting at Heartland last Tuesday.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Four or five years ago this might be spun as a “David versus Goliath” victory for the humble little blogosphere, what with a simple little blog post doing what the city’s paid media failed to do in bringing visibility and response to this issue. But we’re really past that point. Russo’s blog is part of the Star Tribune website, for gosh sake. David and Goliath are no longer so easy to distinguish.<\/p>\n

In any case, the gist of the story is that they all sat down at a table and talked out Russo’s objection… at which point Councilman Carter had a metaphorical “D’oh!” moment a la Homer Simpson.<\/p>\n

As our conversation progressed, I found him to be quite receptive to understanding how restaurants of Heartland’s ilk operate and how his proposal would stifle our ability to succeed in St. Paul while actually making people less safe. He expressed that his intention was not to do so. In addition, it rapidly became clear to him that an allergen handbook such as the one he put forth in his most recent draft was not the best way to address his concerns. … Consequently, it took Melvin about forty five minutes to declare that the idea of an allergen handbook is off the table.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Whether you own a restaurant in Saint Paul or eat in one (guilty! – ed.<\/em>) that’s good news. And there’s a lot more about it in Russo’s post which I would encourage you to read – especially if you read his previous post on the topic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A couple of weeks back we noted Chef Lenny Russo’s urgent complaint about an impending Saint Paul city ordinance related to restaurants. Russo was so alarmed by the ordinance that he announced plans to move his restaurant out of the city. This weekend, Russo posted an update. A lot of people in both Minneapolis and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":212,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[57,28],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-economy-and-the-market","category-st-paul"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/212"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5408\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}