After a year-long battle, A&M BBQ on South Main Street was told definitively by the City that it could not operate its two large industrial smokers on Main Street. The Sebastopol City Council on Tuesday rejected two re-zoning options, which might have allowed the popular restaurant to continue using the smokers at its Sebastopol location.
“It definitely wasn’t the outcome that we were hoping for,” Kris Austin, the “A” of A&M BBQ, told Sebastopol Times on Wednesday. “At this point, I’m ready for a new beginning. It’s been almost a year of my life.”
At a previous meeting, the Sebastopol City Council Council had asked staff to prepare two zoning options that would have allowed outdoor commercial barbecues in the City’s CO (Office Commercial) zoning district. In this meeting, the Council didn’t spend much time reviewing those options and instead voted for a third option, which was to leave the zoning as it is and resume enforcement. A&M BBQ will have to find a new site for its smokers and perhaps a new location for its restaurant. The question is whether that new location will be in Sebastopol.
A small smoker replaced by two large smokers
In March of 2024, Marvin McKinzy opened a deli and BBQ at the South Main Street location. Later, in June of that year, he merged his business with Kris Austin to form A&M BBQ and then McKinzy left the business. Eventually, the original small smoker outside the deli was replaced by two large industrial smokers. Concerns about air quality caused by the smoke were raised by neighbors in the area. In May, the City sent a cease-and-desist letter in May to the owners who began looking at other locations. The City also paused enforcement while it looked at options for re-zoning the location.
Mayor Jill McLewis said she’d “heard rumors about all different things about what the actual owners are doing with the business.” She’d heard that the owners were looking for other locations. When she asked if the owners were present to answer any questions, A&M partner Finn Liss stepped up to the podium.
“What I can share is we've looked at so many properties in the last three, four months, including in Sebastopol, and all over the Sonoma County,” he said. “These things take time. It's hard to find a place where we can just move in in a month.” He said that they were about 95% done negotiating a lease on a new property, but he wouldn’t say anything about its location. He also mentioned that the owner of the El Coronel Mexican Restaurant had offered them a one-acre parcel where they could place a smoker. Unfortunately, its zoning is also CO.
“It appears that you have found a new home,” said McLewis. Liss said that was the goal. Neysa Hinton asked if they were moving out of town “no matter what.” Liss responded: “No, not matter what.” Then, Hinton said: “But you're proposing a temporary solution, possibly of El Corornel.”
“Yes, he replied. “What we're trying to do is while we're negotiating a new permanent home, understand what can we do temporarily. He said that they had removed one of the large smokers and purchased a new, smaller smoker. He then asked what defines a small and big smoker in the City’s eyes.
McLewis asked the City Attorney Alex Mog to respond and he said that they didn’t have a definition of big and small and later said that the code only talks about permitting of commercial outdoor barbecues for cooking food.
Phill Carter wanted to know more about the new smoker and the old smoker. Liss explained that he had “two smokers for two different purposes.” The smaller smoker that we use for service cook, which is Wednesday, we typically use from 3:30 in the morning until 11 in the morning. That is going to run at a higher temperature where you get that really clean blue smoke, which is almost invisible and is considered clean smoke. The big smoker, which understandably our neighbors are concerned about, is what we cook all of our briskets on and all of our beef products. That's Mondays and Tuesdays. Those require much longer cooking time.”
The plan, he said, was “to take that smoker offsite at El Coronel but keep the new smoker on site, “which has way less smoke, and has clean smoke.”
Neysa Hinton then asked: “When you came before us at a previous meeting, you mentioned that you had your large smoker off-site, and you had employees driving to retrieve the beef, and that was a hardship on the business but yet you were doing it?” She wanted to know how far away the cooking location was from the restaurant.
Liss said that they were cooking the meat three miles away and driving it to the South Main Street location. “Honestly, our team were willing to do whatever it took to make it work. The issue was Sonoma County Health Department found out, and they're like, "Well, you can't transport meat back and forth. That's why we stopped because we don't want to get in trouble with Health Department.” He said they had to pivot really quickly. “If we go to El Coronel, we can do a conditional use permit; it's way closer to five blocks away.” They also have a kitchen where they can store the meat. This would be a temporary solution, he explained. (During public comment, one person pointed out that El Coronel is across the street from Apple Valley Post Acute Care facility.)
Liss was also frustrated that he’s been asking the City Building Department, in an email written on May 21st after receiving the cease-and-desist letter, to detail the specific violations. He just got that information the day before the Council meeting.
Daryl A. Phillips, the head of the City’s Building and Safety Department acknowledged that the City had not responded to the May 21st email. “We had a staff member go off. We had it prepared, and we thought it had been sent, and it was not.” He added that other information had been sent to the owners of A&M Barbecue. “The big problem here is that none of the people associated with A&M Barbecue right now were there when the business was first approved in 2023. They're all gone. … This is an entirely new crew, and it did create some problems on both sides with that issue.” Phillips commented that “the original smoker was the size of three of chairs in this room but the large smokers that are there now would basically fill the whole room.”
During public comment, affected neighbors as well as fans and employees of A&M BBQ weighed in. The Council recognized that the restaurant was a successful small business in Sebastopol, but none of them wanted to support any re-zoning that would allow the A&M BBQ’s large smokers to continue operating. Council member Stephen Zollman made the motion “to direct staff not to take any re-zoning action particular to the subject site and to reinitiate enforcement actions.” It was approved by all.
Outdoor commercial barbecues will continue to be prohibited in the CO District. Kris Austin told Sebastopol Times: “We’re still on the hunt for a new location.”
From the archives of Sebastopol Times.
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There's suspicion and then there is conspiracy, but the easiest answer is the actual visible issue -> two large smokers cause issues for neighbors , and that is what zoning is for. Zoning began as a way to keep [coal plants] far from residential areas. There were a lot of people trying hard to find the win win solution to keep them where they are, including the neighbors and restaurant owners working together. But the issue is complicated. Smoke capturing devices are very expensive. Engineering stamps and permits which make near term solutions are expensive. That money actually takes away from money that could be used at a new space.
Moving to a new site requires extensive refitting for their type of cooking. It's a very hard situation - especially for early business owners capturing rapid growth. I and many others in town tried to help. Simply, there is a lack of affordable restaurant location options with the right zoning -- similar to a lack of affordable housing. Everyone on the council wants them to be successful.
This is just so horrible. The city is so against this small business, something else must be going on. People tell me never ever try to open a small business in Sebastopol. You can see for yourself how many have left, driven out of the city. Meanwhile people walk through the Barlow with open alcohol containers and it's never enforced. Traffic laws are unenforced making Sebastopol among the most dangerous small towns in California. The crystal ball says someone influential lives near by and is complaining or someone wants to put a BBQ in the Barlow but won't until the local business goes.