Urgent Appeal for COPA: Elizabeth and Roberto need our help

Elizabeth and Roberto need our help. In order to keep COPA they need to raise $16,000.00 by the end of this month.

Those of you who know them know that from their beginnings at Old Havana Sandwich Shop and now at COPA, the restaurant business has never been just a business for these two. Roberto and Elizabeth’s vision has always been of creating a place that fosters community and relationship: with the local farmers whose sustainable agriculture they purchase; with their employees to whom they pay a living wage, and with whom they create a safe, nurturing, and respectful workplace; with the broader small business community for whom they have been effective advocates; and with their guests, many of whom they know by name and now count as friends, and all of whom they welcome with delicious meals, creatively and meticulously prepared and served with attentive care and kindness.

Now, however, the events of recent years have abruptly caught up with Roberto and Elizabeth. The pandemic, the variable rate loan offered by the Small Business Administration in an era when interest rates have skyrocketed, and the sharp increase in the cost of doing business due to rising prices and supply chain issues mean that the two of them urgently need legal assistance to hold off foreclosure and continue to do the work they do so well — creating community one delicious meal at a time.

If you know Elizabeth and Roberto you know that they are endlessly creative, hardworking, and unfailing generous people. They have supported their community in countless ways. Now we have a chance to do the same for them.

Please donate whatever you can. Please share this appeal. And please don’t take excellent businesses like COPA for granted. COPA is about delicious food and also about community, justice, good stewardship of the land, and cultivating an economy that is good for people.

$16,000 is a lot, but not if we all pitch in.

Please help, and thank you.