Want to dine out in the Keys or buy booze? You now have an extra hour to do it

You can now dine in a restaurant and buy alcohol until midnight in the Florida Keys through at least Labor Day.

In a 3-2 decision Wednesday, the Monroe County Commission added one hour to its previous restaurant and alcohol sales cutoff time, which had been 11 p.m. since July 24.

The commission originally made the restrictions in advance of lobster miniseason, anticipating large crowds from the mainland during the last week of July.

But in the age of COVID-19, a majority of the panel wants to keep cutoff times in place.

Restaurant dining rooms must clear out by midnight and they may reopen at 5 a.m. Alcohol sales are banned from midnight to 7 a.m.

Customers must be paid up and out of the restaurants by midnight.

Commissioners Craig Cates and Michelle Coldiron dissented, while County Mayor Heather Carruthers and Commissioners David Rice and Sylvia Murphy voted in favor of the midnight restriction.

Cates, of Key West, said the restrictions are cutting workers’ paychecks and overall hurting businesses. He wants to allow restaurants to go back to regular hours.

“They finally get busy a little bit on the weekends and then they have to close early,” Cates said after the meeting. “Give these poor businesses a little chance. These people are struggling.”

Rice, of Marathon, said there are good reasons behind the restrictions.

“We are also protecting the health of the public and trying to balance a tourist economy,” Rice said.

Carruthers, of Key West, said it was premature to end the restriction entirely.

Bill Lay, who owns Benihana in Key West, asked the commission to let the restriction expire, or at the very least give his industry an extra hour to stay open.

“This is it, the weekends are what we have,” Lay said. “Our table turn is just getting longer and longer. You’re not allowed to sit at the bar in Key West. That extra hour would be extremely helpful to businesses down here.”

The restrictions will last through Sept. 7, which is Labor Day. The commission plans to revisit the issue at its Sept. 8 budget hearing.

Gwen Filosa

Miami Herald

Gwen Filosa covers Key West and the Lower Florida Keys for FLKeysNews.com and the Miami Herald and lives in Key West. She was part of the staff at the New Orleans Times-Picayune that in 2005 won two Pulitzer Prizes for coverage of Hurricane Katrina. She graduated from Indiana University.