City Hall gets burned as NYC pizza oven crackdown heats up

From how it’s cooked to how it’s folded to how it’s eaten, pizza is a very serious business in New York City.

So when the city issued a proposal Friday to try and help restaurant owners cut down on dangerous emissions from coal- and wood-burning pizza ovens, the reaction was predictably heated. Under the plan, restaurants with coal- and wood-burning stoves installed before 2016 would have to submit to a professional review to see if there is a way they could filter pollutants safely.

The proposal left a bad taste in some pizza lovers’ mouths.

Right-wing activist Scott LoBaido showed up at City Hall on Monday and delivered a profanity-laced speech aimed at what he referred to as “woke” lawmakers behind the proposal. He then proceeded to hurl slices of pizza over at the gate.

“Give us pizza or give us death,” he yelled.

By the afternoon, Mayor Eric Adams was forced to confront what had become the city’s newest Pizzagate.

“I think pizzas have saved more marriages than any other foods,” he told reporters, defending the beloved cheesy staple. “Sharing a pie with your boo is like, that's the ultimate.”

Adams said the city was seeking to remove hazardous types of smoke without hurting businesses. He said the rules were still being worked out.

“And the public can weigh in without throwing pizza over my gate,” the mayor added.

The city plans to hold a public hearing on the proposed regulation in the coming weeks.

“This is utter bs. It won’t make a difference to climate change,” Twitter and Tesla owner Elon Musk tweeted in response to a New York Post story, which reported some business owners pushing back on the potential rule.

Prior to that, conservatives blamed the pizza crackdown on misguided legislation from Democrats. The rule is estimated as affecting fewer than 100 businesses, but they potentially include several old-style establishments favored by pizza aficionados like John’s in Greenwich Village, Patsy’s in Turtle Bay and the Upper West Side and Grimaldi’s near the Brooklyn Bridge.

“We will save the planet by putting 9 or 10 fantastic #NYC pizzerias out of business! Gunna really change things you guys!” tweeted Joe Borelli, a Republican councilmember from Staten Island, home to a robust Italian American population.

The proposed requirements have been long in the making, intended to comply with a 2015 law that requires restaurants with coal- and wood-burning stoves to install equipment to reduce emissions by up to 75%.

And some exceptions will be granted. City officials noted that restaurants who are unable to retrofit their building or stoves will not be forced to do so.

“All New Yorkers deserve to breathe healthy air and coal and wood-fired stoves are among the largest contributors of harmful pollutants in neighborhoods with poor air quality,” said Edward Timbers, a spokesperson for the city Department of Environmental Protection. “This common-sense rule, developed with restaurant and environmental justice groups, requires a professional review of whether installing emission controls is feasible.”

Andrew Rigie, executive director of the NYC Hospitality Alliance, the city’s restaurant lobby, told Gothamist that city officials have been working with the industry on the new rule.

He said it was difficult to say exactly how many pizza owners would be subject to retrofitting their buildings or ovens. But he estimated that the costs could spiral into tens of thousands of dollars. One unnamed restaurateur told the Post that he spent $20,000 on an air filter system in hopes of addressing the new mandate.

“There’s going to be a cost and burden for small businesses to hire an engineer or architect to determine if they can even comply with this standard,” Rigie said. “For those that can comply, it’s going to be expensive and complicated.”

The mayor said the city’s policy is intended to address the very issues around harmful pollutants that helped exacerbate the city’s air quality crisis earlier this month.

But Adams, an avowed vegan, had one request to those registering complaints to City Hall.

“I'm going to call the person who threw pizza over my gate to tell him he needs to bring a vegan pie to me so we can sit down,” he said. “I want to hear his side of this.”