Protesters say Wichita restaurant owner holds racist views. The owner disagrees
The protest happened during the lunch hour Wednesday on the sidewalk in front of B&C Barbecue, 355 N. Washington.
Organized by a newly formed group called Project Justice ICT, it attracted a crowd of between 30 and 40 activists who held signs decrying what they said was the restaurant owner’s racist behavior and attitude.
As customers entered the restaurant for lunch, the protesters implored them to eat elsewhere, even suggesting other nearby restaurants. As diners left, demonstrators asked them why they would support a business whose owner held racists views.
Inside, Carey Maurer — who runs the business his late parents founded in 1996 — watched it unfold but decided to stay inside.
The protesters don’t want to hear his side of the story, he said afterward, so why bother?
On Wednesday, B&C became the latest Wichita restaurant to get caught up in the escalating tension of the Black Lives Matter movement that has included protests and demonstrations around the country since George Floyd died after a police officer in Minneapolis held him to the pavement with a knee on his neck.
Early last week, several Wichita restaurants — The Kitchen and Livingston’s Diner among them — were called out in a Facebook post by a young Wichita activist for making donations to a group of police wives who were gathering items to feed police during protests rather than also to other groups that work for racial equality. The restaurant owners and their supporters all fired back.
Then later in the week, Nortons Brewing Company was targeted by a group of online commenters who left negative reviews on the business’s Facebook page after noticing Black Lives Matter signs in its window. That debate escalated on social media, too, garnering hundreds of comments and shares.
The protesters at B&C and Mauer both agree on the basic details of the incident that sparked Wednesday’s protest.
It started nearly five weeks ago when a Black woman returned her food to the restaurant, saying there was a hair in it. The protesters say Maurer became belligerent and hurled racial slurs at the woman. Maurer says he offered to replace the meal but insisted that the long hair in the food couldn’t have come from his workers. He became upset when she called him a name. He called her a name back, though he didn’t use a slur, he said, and he called the police to escort her out.
After the lunch-hour protest, Maurer said that he is not a racist and that he didn’t consider Facebook posts he made that were shared by the group — including one posted during Barack Obama’s presidency in 2013 that said “Just saw Air Force one. Can’t believe it has spinners on it” — to be racist. Maurer said he thought he was making a joke, he said.
Other racist quotes that were attributed to him on the signs the protesters held outside of his restaurant, he said, were made up by an ex-girlfriend’s relative or provided by disgruntled ex employees.
“I don’t care what color you are,” he said. “It doesn’t make a difference to me. Behavior makes a difference to me, and respect is earned. If you’re going to be disrespectful to me, I’m going to defend myself.”
Maurer closed his personal and business Facebook pages on Tuesday, he said, after the angry comments got to be too much.
Among the demonstrators gathered at the lunchtime protest was Pastor Maurice W. Evans, who goes by Pastor Moe and is serving as an adviser to Project Justice ICT.
The group decided to protest, he said, after gathering stories and evidence from people who have worked at B&C, people who know Maurer and Maurer’s own words on social media.
“It’s not just an accusation,” he said. “This is a pattern of behavior.”
He said the group isn’t planning to protest any other businesses unless the community comes to it with evidence that there’s a problem.
Gabby Griffie, the group’s executive director, said members of Project Justice ICT won’t tolerate racism in Wichita.
“We just want to bring awareness,” she said. “We want to call people out.”
The protest, which started shortly after noon, broke up about 1:40 p.m., but the organizers asked people to return from 4 to 6 p.m.
This story was originally published June 17, 2020 at 5:22 PM.
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