I went to Banzai Sushi last night and left before even being seated due to the unacceptable manner in which I was harangued about whether my service dog is truly a service dog. I have lived in the neighborhood for ten years now and have been to Banzai about a dozen times in that period.
I am a disabled veteran, and after years of waiting, I finally got a VA-sponsored service dog 4.5 months ago to help me just function and navigate socially in life after having gone through some extremely traumatic events while serving and shedding blood for my country.
My dog (an English cream golden) received five months of expert training followed by me undergoing five weeks of daily handler training with Northwest Battle Buddies (https://northwestbattlebuddies.org/) in Battleground, WA. We trained daily in stores, malls, restaurants, the light rail, and even through the TSA lines at PDX.
I brought my dog home to Sacramento almost five months ago. He goes with me everywhere. I am with him at the Greenhaven Grocery Outlet or the croissant place next store nearly every day always walking by Banazai in the process. He is always vested, wearing his official Front Street shelter-issued Sacramento service-dog tag, and under leash control at my left side. He has never caused a disturbance or had any accidents. In restaurants, he just lays at my feet and goes to sleep. If you weren't looking, you wouldn't even know he was there. I've taken him to several dozen restaurants and never had an issue until Banzai staff confronted me last night.
I did not expect that my local sushi place would look down on that, question whether my clearly identified service dog was a legitimate service dog, and violate ADA law repeatedly in the process. I get many people exploit the system claiming their pets or ESAs are service animals. Nobody hates that more than legitimate service dog handlers. But that does not give you the right to presume everybody is doing so and violate ADA law.
When my wife, my service dog, and I arrived at Banzai yesterday evening one of your staff members asked to see some sort of certificate proving he is a service dog. Despite the fact that no such standardized certificate exists; you are not allowed to ask that question...nor is a service animal required to be vested or visually marked in any way as being a service dog. Still, mine always is. I showed you his vest and Sacramento city-issued service dog tag to you. That was still apparently not enough for you, as you made some snarky comment about how service dogs "usually are."
You gave us a table but continued to comment that you were somehow justified in your grilling of even claiming what we need to read the fine print of the ADA laws. There is no "fine print" (you made that up). I tried to explain to you calmly and politely that your interpretation of the law was not based on reality. I was met with a "I'm sorry you feel that way" condescending platitude. I explained that this had nothing to do me feeling any sort of way, but rather, from the spoken words out of your mouth. By this point, I had no desire to be a continuing patron of Banzai Sushi and providing revenue to a place with such disrespect and unwarranted skepticism of disabled veterans and the service dogs which allow them to function in society.
BTW,
There are only two questions you can ask a person presenting what they claim is a service dog:
1) Is the dog a service animal required because of a disability?
2) What work or task has the dog been trained to perform?
That's it. No demanding of non-existent certificates or fabricating your own unlearned criteria of what a service dog is and does. Furthermore, there are only two instances where you can deny or revoke a service dogs presence in your establishment:
* The dog is not housebroken.
* The dog is out of control, and the person cannot get the dog under control.
Neither of those was or has ever been a problem with my well-trained service dog. It would probably be good for your staff to familiarize themselves with the law without fabricating "fine print" clauses. Here is a good place to start:
https://www.ada.gov/topics/service-animals/ read more