City Moves Quickly to Help Portsmouth Businesses Survive

Challenged from the start, like every one else, the City of Portsmouth moved quickly to guard public health and safety and to recognize the pandemic’s impact on the local economy. City Hall shut down on March 16, but City services continued online while all of the municipal departments kept tabs on the health of every local sector of residents and businesses, streamlining the process for restaurants to establish outdoor dining (and facilitate pickup for takeout orders). In total more than 180 permits for dining and expanded use of public spaces were approved.

The Portsmouth City Council formed the Citizen Response Task Force that held its first meeting June 9th charged with among other tasks, the role of “addressing the urgent need from downtown restaurants, retail and arts businesses who might otherwise go out of business, leaving the downtown with empty storefronts and improving the adoption and adherence of proposed policies.”

 The Task Force formed two subcommittees to look at 1) how Downtown Streets might be used for dining and 2) whether the idea of using the roof of the Foundry Place Garage as a performance/restaurant space would work.

In the 7 weeks since the CRTF was formed, the City Planning and permitting process, DPW (who secured concrete barriers at no charge from Severino Trucking Co.) and the committee worked with 21 restaurant owners to convert parking spaces into dining spaces.

In parallel, the Foundry Place subcommittee worked with City departments including DPW engineers and determined a better location for the PopUp venue was the Bridge Street parking lot. Once the design and operations plans meet all permitting requirements from the City’s Health, Building Inspection, Fire and Legal Departments, the new PopUp NH venue will open under strict physical-distancing and other health precautions.

So far, the City has spent about half of the $100,000 allocated by the City Council to implement Task Force recommendations. The City has paid about $45,000 directly to the suppliers of the generators, fencing, porta-potties (including a cleaning and maintenance plan for the duration of the rentals) and to create the water/sewer/wastewater infrastructure to serve the Bridge Street Lot popup. No City monies have gone, or can go, to any of the project collaborators. The plan is that the City will use Federal CARES Act funds for the expenses, so spending is strictly limited in accordance with what FEMA will reimburse under the CARES Act. The balance of the City Council-designated funds remain in reserve for future City projects related to sustaining Portsmouth businesses as the impact of the pandemic is felt.

The CRTF has now formed a third subcommittee to advise the City Council on health matters related to the pandemic, such as the wearing of face coverings and tracking COVID-19 data specific to the Seacoast. The CRTF will be reviewing other related opportunities to assist the City Council for the remainder of their service, through December 2020.

Parts of the following streets have been barricaded to allow for dining in the street in place of parking spaces.

• Congress Street – Flatbread, Goat, Jumpin’ Jay’s
• Congress Street – Rudi’s, Thirsty Moose
• Bridge/Hill Streets – Bridge Street Bistro, Dwyer’s Pub
• Worth Lot – Friendly Toast, Café Mediterraneo, Maison Navarre
• State Street – Mr. Kim’s, Fezziwig’s
• Penhallow – Cure, Ceres Bakery, Massimo’s, Moxy
• Market Street – Portsmouth Gas Light, Portsmouth Brewery, Cup of Joe, Durbar Square
• Pleasant Street – Clipper Tavern

For details on restaurants open for outside, inside and public realm outdoor dining, click here.

For more information, click here to visit the Citizen Response Task Force web page, that provides the materials and resources the committee is using. All meetings are conducted publicly via zoom and are posted in advance on the City website homepage. To contact the Citizen Response Task Force, email via hotline@cityofportsmouth.com