The Huntington Beach City Council unanimously voted Monday night to direct staff to explore a plan that would expand outdoor dining in the city during the novel coronavirus pandemic.

An agenda item on labeling all businesses as essential and reopening them, however, was tabled before coming to a vote. That concluded the nearly five-hour meeting, which ended a few minutes after midnight.

Councilmen Mike Posey and Patrick Brenden introduced the item on expanding local restaurants and allowing for outdoor table service.

“My vision is that on private property, restaurants that are limited to a certain percentage of indoor capacity may not necessarily need the number of parking spaces they have outdoors,” Posey said. “Those parking spaces can be utilized for outdoor restaurant service, and that combination would be fluid. As the number of patrons can increase on the inside, the parking spaces on the outside would decrease.

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