Point Reyes Light - December 9, 2004
Drakes Beach Café's future uncertain
By Jacob Resneck
After telling Drakes Beach Café concessionaire Jonne LeMieux that she would lose her café of 23 years, the National Park Service has said she can stay – at least for now.
Last July, LeMieux learned that a technical flaw in her application for a long-term contract had disqualified her from winning the contract for the concession to run the Drakes Beach Cafe in the Point Reyes National Seashore. The Park Service told her that her concession would go to the only other applicant who had submitted an application.
LeMieux was dismayed to learn that the applicant was a former employee of hers whom she fired in 2002 for mismanagement of the café. He subsequently sued LeMieux after she withheld a rental deposit in order to pay for damages to the café and on-site trailer where he was living. A Marin Superior Court judge ruled against him.
When LeMieux learned of her disqualification, she immediately appealed to the Park Service. LeMieux argued that, having run the café for more than two decades, she had a long record of customer satisfaction. Moreover, she still owed more than $45,000 on a small-business loan she had taken out for improvements to the café. In order to receive the loan, the park superintendent at the time, Supt. John Sansing, submitted paperwork attesting that LeMieux was on track to receive a long-year contract from the Park Service.
But for reasons unclear, rather than issue her the contract, each year the Park Service continued to extend her temporary lease. LeMieux was finally invited to submit a prospectus in April of 2003 to apply for a long-term contract.
Technical flaw scuttled application
After waiting nearly a year for a response, the Park Service wrote to LeMieux in June, informing her that she had not completed the final page in the application (erroneously printed as page 22 of 21) which covered "secondary considerations" in her proposal. Therefore, the letter informed her, the concession would go to the other applicant. After being told she would lose her business, LeMieux feared bankruptcy. Managing the café at the time was her son, Jason Meyerson. He lived on the site with his wife Natalia and their two children who attended Inverness School. In the face of uncertainty over the café’s future, last month Meyerson left the café and moved his family to Novato where he has found a permanent job. Since then, LeMieux has taken over running the restaurant in his place.
In October, LeMieux received a letter from the Park Service’s Pacific West Region headquarters in Oakland informing her that the whole contract process had been canceled and that she could remain after all. The letter said that, at some point in the future, the bidding process would start all over again, and that she could reapply then. She was, in effect, back where she started in April, 2003.
LeMieux told she can stay – for now
The Park Service said it canceled the long-term contract because major water and sewer improvements were due to start in December and would require interruptions to operation of the of the café, bathrooms, and the visitor’s center at Drakes Beach.
Supt. Don Neubacher told The Light Wednesday that work is scheduled to begin in two weeks, but that it will not affect the visitors’ center or the café at Drakes Beach after all.
LeMieux, for her part, said she is happy that she can remain, though she is puzzled by the Park Service’s shifting rationale. She said she’s relieved the café won’t be temporarily closed, but she wants some assurance that she can get her long-term contract.
"I just lost my freezer in the last storm," LeMieux said Wednesday. "So I’m supposed to go out and buy a new one with only a three-month guarantee on the café?"
In November, LeMieux’s attorney Jack Siedman sent a letter to the regional headquarters in Oakland, pointing out that the director of the region could legally grant LeMieux a contract for her concession without forcing her to go through the whole process again. Such a move is allowed by law if, "extraordinary circumstances exist" that are in the "public interest," Siedman wrote, arguing that LeMieux’s long-history of running Drakes Beach Café, coupled with her "well-established track record" should be reason enough for the Park Service to grant her a long-term contract.
Siedman said Wednesday he has yet to receive a response from the regional office.
Regional HQ will reopen concession
Regional spokeswoman Holly Bundock for the Pacific West Region said that her office was still planning to re-issue a prospectus that would be open for bidding, but that she didn’t know when a new prospectus would be issued.
"The [new] prospectus isn’t rewritten yet. They’re working on it," Bundock said. "We will extend LeMieux’s contract until a new contract is awarded."
Point Reyes National Seashore spokesman John Dell’Osso said that LeMieux will be allowed to continue running Drakes Beach Café for the time being. "What we’ll need to do is extend her contract for the next few months," he said. And what can explain the Park Service’s odd behavior and mixed messages? First she had lost her concession, now she might be able to stay after all?
Dell’Osso told The Light, "We will do what we can at this level to make sure that that doesn’t happen again." Dell’Osso replied, adding that the new prospectus may have some new language about the type of food service the National Seashore is interested in, and that LeMieux will be invited to reapply.
"I just hope I get my 10-year contract," LeMieux said. "I’ve put so much of my life into this. I don’t want to see it all wash away. Four generations of LeMieuxs have worked here at one time or another."