By Steven Dahlman

May 19, 2026 – The federal lawsuit challenging how the City of Chicago awards concession licenses on the Chicago Riverwalk has moved into a new phase. Court documents from late April and mid-May 2026 detail the contrasting legal positions of former vendor Beat Kitchen, the City of Chicago, and the current tenant, Haire’s Gulf Shrimp.

At issue is a civil rights complaint filed in December 2025 by Robert Gomez, owner of Beat Kitchen. Gomez alleges that the Department of Fleet and Facility Management (2FM) and the Brandon Johnson administration manipulated the 2024 bidding process to ensure Haire’s Gulf Shrimp secured the contract for the high-traffic Riverwalk site on the west side of the DuSable Bridge, bypassing established rules in order to favor a Black-owned business over the incumbent Hispanic owner.

Following the City’s March 2026 motion to dismiss the lawsuit, both the plaintiff and the co-defendant vendor have laid out their arguments before U.S. District Judge Thomas M. Durkin.

On April 27, 2026, Beat Kitchen’s legal team filed a 41-page Consolidated Opposition, arguing that the case contains specific factual evidence of procedural deviations. The document details areas where the City’s Evaluation Committee allegedly departed from uniform criteria:

• Post-Deadline Intervention: Beat Kitchen alleges that City officials secretly invited Haire’s to submit a late proposal weeks after the public solicitation window had closed.

• Proposal Deficiencies: The opposition highlights that Haire’s proposal was advanced despite missing financial statements, a required Opinion of Counsel, and a Minimum Annual Guarantee (MAG) – noting that an exhibit from Haire’s application showed a question mark (“?”) filled out in the MAG column.

• Targeted Allocation: The filing references internal evaluation records showing that an Evaluation Committee member directed colleagues to “propose location 2 to [Haire’s],” despite Haire’s having initially applied for a separate marketplace program.

Beat Kitchen argues these actions were the direct result of operational directives trickling down from City Hall, pointing to explicit administrative tools – including the City’s Budget Equity Tool and mandatory departmental Racial Equity Action Plans – as the framework that led procurement officials to prioritize racial identity over rule-bound contracting.

Co-defendant argues it does not belong in middle of lawsuit

On May 15, 2026, co-defendant Haire’s Gulf Shrimp filed its formal reply brief, arguing that it has been improperly swept into a dispute that belongs strictly between Beat Kitchen and the City. Haire’s emphasizes that Beat Kitchen has already conceded it does not seek monetary damages from Haire’s, nor does it allege that the restaurant engaged in independent wrongdoing.

Instead, Haire’s defense hinges on federal standing requirements. “The continuing effect of an alleged past wrong is not the same as a continuing violation,” the reply states, arguing that because the 2024 procurement process is a completed past event, Beat Kitchen cannot claim an immediate threat of future harm from Haire’s presence.

With the briefing schedule concluded, formal discovery remains paused while Judge Durkin determines whether the lawsuit meets federal pleading standards.