Good Morning,

When arriving to celebrate one of my buddies 50th Birthday dinner on 07/20/20, there was initially a feeling of the lack of hospitality. With a party of twelve professional men/woman, we were never given the option of sitting inside, as we were advised that due to the “INFORMAL CELEBRATION” of which we simply wanted to indulge and enjoy some seafood, we would have to be seated outside in 95 plus degree weather, whereas fans would be available as a convenience. My thought exactly and I know what your thinking.... “ON A HUMID DAY WITH A HEAT INDEX OF 101 DEGREES” are you kidding me. My sentiments exactly. Immediate after advising my party that there was no way that I would be sitting outside, I advised and requested to sit inside where we could all follow all “social distancing protocols” relative to seating. After we were seated and roughly ten mins had gone by, we were approached by a (white female) of which believed was either the Manager and or Owner, where she began to gesture with her finger over her mouth in a sarcastic and child like way and advised that we “WOULD HAVE TO LOWER OUR VOICES”, mind you there are no other patrons and or customers in the seating area and as middle aged professional adult woman/men, we have the unequivocal right to speak amongst ourselves in a respectful and orderly fashion. After realizing what had just occurred and after speaking with some of my counterparts, I respectfully approached the older woman with all due professional courtesy/respect and advise that I along with my party took offense with the way in which she had come over to address “GROWN ADULTS” as if we were being chastised as children and to be frank I advised her that as a forty nine year old handsome African American man, husband of twenty one years, father of two adult sons/one teenaged daughter and honor society student, grandfather, and Public Safety Worker serving my great State of Maryland, I will never be subject to such disrespect, disregard, and lack of customer service when patronizing an establishment. I further more advised in all of my years and having traveled the world, I have never had an interaction such as this relative to respectful adults being told to “SHISH” and “YOUR GOING TO HAVE TO LOWERE YOUR VOICES”. Immediately after my brief advisement, I returned to our table where our orders were taken by a wonderful and awesome waiter by the name of Kaitlin (Caucasian Female). After everyone’s orders were taken, we began to get back to conversing and making an attempt to enjoy the evening when what we believe was another “Manager” had come out with what I’m assuming monitoring the eating area to a degree. Now one might ask well Mr. West that’s what the staff is supposed to do and if I may interject and say that working in Law Enforcement in the position of Crime Scene Technician, I think I would know when someone is being monitored and or looked at. Further more as a consummate consumer, I would definitely recognize inadequate customer service. After we concluded our meal and the bill(s) has arrived, we were notified by Kaitlin that she had observed the lack of etiquette, customer service, and unprofessional interaction with the Manager and or Owner coming over, that she was “DISGUSTED” with the way in which our party was approached and or made to feel unwelcome. After we paid for our meals, I along with another one of my counterparts (female), began to advise Kaitlin that she had done a wonderful job in rendering her expectation along service and there was no need to for her to be upset, where she advise that she wanted to “CRY” due to what she had observed/witnessed. Of course we had to tip her well and I along with another counterpart advise the staff at the register that Kaitlin was the best experience of the evening. I’ll conclude by saying this, relative to society and the climate at present, one would think that we would all attempt to put a “BEST FOOD FORWARD” in wanting to show and interact with more humility. “BIAS WILL NOT BE TOLERATED”

R. West BS, 2L