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At IHOP, a day without workers
By AMANDA STEWART
astewart@potomacnews.com
Tuesday, May 2, 2006

About 24 Hispanic employees who cook, wash dishes and clean tables at the restaurant participated in the "Day Without Immigrants" strike and did not show up for work, said general manager Sam Rahman.

That's about 35 to 40 percent of the staff, he said.

"This is very significant for us," he said.

Around noon, managers were clearing tables, cooking and washing dishes to keep up with business at the restaurant.

"I had to pull some of the managers off of vacation to come in today," Rahman said.

Rahman said IHOP's managers had anticipated the strike and did what they could to prepare.

"We knew that this could happen, so we had time to prepare and get the managers in here," he said.

Even so, it was a rough day at the restaurant at some points Monday morning, he said.

"We got a rush, and we had a whole bunch of customers in here this morning," he said. "Usually Monday mornings are pretty slow. But today we were busy."

Susie Carter, a server at the restaurant, said she and the other servers took half-hour shifts washing dishes.

"I talked to all of the guests I served and told them what was going on and that we might be a little slow today," she said. "Most of them were perfectly nice about it, but some didn't want to hear it. They just up and left."

Carter estimated that about 10 percent of the customers from the morning shift left when they heard the wait might be longer than usual.

"We waited a few extra minutes for our food, but other than that it didn't really affect us," said Manassas resident Tammy Moll, who ate at IHOP late Monday morning. "To me this shows we can do fine without them."

Moll and a few other customers said they felt the employees should be dealt with harshly for participating in the strike.

"I think they should all be fired," Moll said. "If the rest of us tried to do something like this, we'd be fired."

Rahman said that is a possibility.

"That might be something we do," he said.

He said he would talk to each of the employees and decide what action to take on a case-by-case basis.