Update: City Council Votes To Lower Outdoor Dining Fees

Update, 8:30pm 12/16/2025:

Following testimony by David Anderson before Beaverton City Council, members asked David follow-up questions to better understand the collective “ask”: What would be an affordable or reasonable fee structure for permit renewals on outdoor dining structures occupying a public parking space?

After questions, the Council voted on an amendment on AB 25200 to lower the fees from the proposed $500 per space, to $150 on the first space and $200 on every additional space. This lowers the fees by more than 50% and makes it affordable for not only businesses with single-space structures, but also double-space structures!

We thank the Beaverton City Council for hearing our testimony and reading our letters of concern, and taking action.

Original Post:

The following public comment will be given by David Anderson in person during tonight’s City Council meeting. The session begins at 6pm. We encourage members of the public to attend if possible, else view online by following the instructions posted here:

https://www.beavertonoregon.gov/797/Agendas-Minutes

Hello City Councilmembers, employees, Mayor and everyone watching,

My name is David Anderson. My wife Angela and I own Syndicate Wine Bar, a small business in Old Town Beaverton.

I am concerned for my district. It doesn’t get the foot traffic it used to get. It doesn’t get the business it needs to survive, let alone thrive. There are many thoughts as to why. I’m not here to discuss those tonight.

What I am here to do is report to you what I live every day, in hopes of opening your eyes to the reality we all see.

We see empty restaurants and businesses. On “busy” nights, they are half empty. Rarely is there a wait to get into any place.

When five other businesses joined ours in 2023 to build outdoor dining structures, it was with the hope of creating a vibrant space, to breathe life into our district for the benefit of all. I believe the City calls this “placemaking”.

The City offered us grants, but many of us spent more than $10,000 of our own money, a lot for any small business coming out of a pandemic.

The City now wants to charge us more than was ever discussed just so we have the right to continue using these structures.

We built our dining structures on faith the program would appeal to post-pandemic consumer behavior.

The past two years, however, has seen a return to pre-pandemic behaviors. Customers place comfort as a top factor when choosing seating. If it’s too hot, too sunny, too cold or too windy, or there’s even a little rain, customers prefer to sit indoors.

Only if the weather is perfect, do customers choose outside seating, and then, our indoors is empty. If we run out of outdoor seating, we lose business.

It is a misnomer to say our outdoor structure increases total seating capacity. No, it just gives us a chance to attract the business there is in the district so we don’t lose them to another restaurant.

We love our outdoor structure, but we have our own fees to recover. We are three years away from breaking even on our investment.

To suggest our annual fees should increase from $100 to $750, with others facing $1250, it forces us to make a simple decision: To sell our outdoor structure and recoup some cost, or to dismantle it instead. This is not a threat, this is my reality.

I cannot justify paying these fees during a slow period for my restaurant. I need to save every dollar I can, so I can save every job I provide.

I cannot justify paying a City that cannot manage its own budget, but chooses to penalize small businesses that were misled in a textbook case of bait and switch.

I cannot justify paying a City that would make just $6,000 annually off of these fees from six small businesses, while pouring $180,000 annually into the First Street Dining Commons, which is empty 99% of the time.

If you proceed with these cost increases, you will see a number of dining structures disappear, starting with mine.

If they come down, there will be questions from our customers and community members, and we will show them where to look for answers as they consider their voting choices in the next election.

A Councilmember recently said they feel the dining structures make our district more inviting. Is there not a value for the City to continue investing in the placemaking we small businesses have undertaken, and keep our fees to what we previously agreed to?

Thank you.