The celebrated but controversial Massachusetts chef is back in hot water just a month after announcing the closure of her remaining restaurants.
Barbara Lynch, 60, an acclaimed American restauranteur, recently announced the official closure of her last three remaining eateries of her once-mighty $24 million restaurant empire in Boston following a series of scandals.
Now, the renowned female chef is now being sued by the city of Boston for nearly $1.7 million in unpaid taxes.
‘Ms. Lynch has failed, directly and through her corporate entities, to pay taxes due and owning to the City of Boston despite clear notification from the city,’ the lawsuit stated.
‘As Ms. Lynch continues to evade these taxes due and has publicly announced her plans to sell her remaining restaurant businesses, the city brings this action to recover the over $1.6 million due and accruing.’
Lynch, who helped kick-start Boston’s modern fine-dining scene, opened seven restaurants during her 30-year run in the industry.
But a lawsuit filed on Wednesday through Suffolk Superior Court addressed the ‘vast unpaid amount of taxes’ across her seven establishments in Fort Point, the South End and Beacon Hill – all of which have gone ignored for more than a decade.
No. 9 Park, Lynch’s 4.5 star French restaurant, owes more in taxes than any of her other businesses – more than half a million dollars which date back to 2011.
Barbara Lynch, 60, renowned chef in Boston and an acclaimed American restauranteur, is now being sued by the city of Boston for nearly $1.7 million in unpaid taxes
No. 9 Park, Lynch’s 4.5 star French restaurant, owes more in taxes than any of her other businesses – owing more than half a million dollars dating back to 2011
The lawsuit comes just a month after announcing the closure of her remaining eateries that made up her once-mighty restaurant empire across Boston
She also owes $156,188 in taxes at B&G Oyster, which also dates back to 2011.
The notable but embattled chef owes $515,107 at Menton, another modern French restaurant and $134,714 at Drink, her cocktail bar, that have gone unpaid since 2015.
The lawsuit also claimed that she owes $148,269 in taxes at The Butcher Shop, dating back to 2013, $124,995 at her Italian eatery, Sportello, dating back to 2012 and $8,003 at Stir – a bookstore for cookbooks which also offers classes – that had accrued since 2017.
The suit stated that along with her restaurants’ corporate entities, she failed to pay personal property taxes for many years – which are assessed on equipment, fixtures and other business material – except for one payment from each entity in August of 2021.
Lynch’s seven restaurants, which accumulated more than $20,000 in back taxes over the last several months, received final notices in January of this year.
Her owed tax money is continuing to grow at a rate of $366.94 a day.
The world-leading chef, who was listed as one of the Time’s 100 most influential people in 2017 – is also James Beard Award-winning restaurateur who has received dozens of awards from the foundation.
In 2014, she became the second woman to receive the ‘outstanding restaurateur’ award, which recognizes those who set high standards in restaurant operations and ownership, The Rudder reported.
Lynch opened seven restaurants during her 30-year run in the industry and is known to have kickstarted Boston’s modern fine-dining scene
In January of this year, Lynch announced that she was selling The Butcher Shop to former employees which resulted in 100 lost jobs
The lawsuit filed on Wednesday through Suffolk Superior Court addressed the ‘vast unpaid amount of taxes’ across all of her seven establishments in Fort Point, the South End and Beacon Hill – most of which have gone ignored for more than a decade
But in recent years, her stellar career began to become overshadowed by accusations of toxic working conditions and bullying claims in her kitchens.
In March of last year, two of Lynch’s former employees filed a class-action lawsuit against her, claiming that she had failed to pay out tips to staff after her eateries reopened from the COVID shut-down, the Boston Globe reported.
Lynch was one of the hundreds of businesses that applied to receive loans through the federal Paycheck Protection Plan to help stay afloat during the pandemic.
B&G Oysters received $850,000 and Drink received more than $1.3 million in loans.
But upon returning back to work, employees were told that the restaurant had ‘suspended the tip pool’ and any tips would be used to continue an employee food-and-supply pickup program – which they were ‘welcome to attend’.
The employees claimed that although they are entitled to get the share of tips left by customers in order to take home at least the full minimum wage, they were ultimately paid much less than that.
‘It’s outrageous and a violation of the trust of both the workers and the customers,’ Lou Saban, one of the employment lawyers, told the Boston Globe.
‘The Lynch Collective seems to have allegedly taken these tips that were intended to support the hourly workers who were struggling at the time.’
The city of Boston requested a temporary restraining order against Lynch in their court filing in case there are future sales of her restaurants
Her owed tax money is continuing to grow at a rate of $366.94 a day since the businesses received their final notices in January of this year
Lynch was listed as one of the Time’s 100 most influential people in 2017 – but has been in a handful of scandals since
Just a month later, Lynch was accused of sexually touching her staff when drunk and bullying them – even firing an employee on the spot and threatening to put his head through a window – which resulted in a toxic workplace culture.
More than a dozen former employees came forward with reports of the longstanding problems they were experiencing in her kitchens.
Lynch herself is a sexual assault survivor who had fought against sexism to reach the top of a male-dominated profession.
Twenty of her former employees claimed that she ‘drinks heavily’ and had subjected employees to unwanted propositions and touching.
However they said that because Lynch is a majority owner of her restaurants, they felt unable to take their complaints higher.
A former employee from her luxury cocktail bar Drink claims that, after she was hired in 2015, Lynch came up behind her and caressed her lower back and squeezed her bottom – telling her that they would ‘make a good couple’.
Michaela Horan was hired as the manager of the Butcher Shop in August 2018, but claims she was surprised to find that Lynch did little cooking and a lot of drinking.
She told the Times that Lynch would drink and spontaneously take charge of the kitchen, sending out barely cooked chicken and threatening staff members with knives.
Her stellar career began to become overshadowed by accusations of toxic working conditions and bullying claims in her kitchens
Lynch was said to have threatened staff members with knives
More than a dozen former employees came forward with reports of the longstanding problems they were experiencing in her kitchens – including sexually touching her staff when drunk and bullying them
Despite writing in her memoir about her past troubles with alcohol, she denied the allegations – calling them ‘fantastical’.
‘I expressly reject the various false accusations lodged against me that I have behaved inappropriately with employees or crossed professional guideposts that are important to me,’ Lynch said in a statement at the time.
‘I cannot put out all the fires that flare in this high stress environment and my very modest roots allow me to recognize that I’m far from being above reproach.’
In 2017, Lynch was charged with alleged drunk driving in Gloucester, Massachusetts, while driving home from work at one of her restaurants.
The report alleged that she said she had ‘a few glasses of wine with dinner’ and ‘did not know what happened.’
After failing a series of field sobriety tests, Barbara was found to have had a blood alcohol content of 0.159, nearly twice the legal limit.
All of her scandals eventually took a toll and she began pulling back from her series of Boston establishments at the end of 2023.
Six weeks after closing The Butcher Shop for a ‘summer break,’ it became clear that the South End restaurant had gone dark.
In March of last year, two of Lynch’s former employees filed a class-action lawsuit against her, claiming that she had failed to pay out tips to staff after her eateries reopened from the COVID shut-down
In 2017, Lynch was also charged with alleged drunk driving in Gloucester, Massachusetts , while driving home from work at one of her restaurants
In January of this year, she announced she would close her three eateries in Fort Point and sell The Butcher Shop and Stir to former employees – which resulted in 100 lost jobs, the Boston Globe reported.
Just last month, she shared to Instagram the closure of her newest endeavor, The Rudder, which is a waterfront seafood restaurant in Gloucester.
By the end of the day, she announced the closure of her remaining three restaurants, bokep claiming that the financial challenges of running the businesses contributed to her ultimate decision, the Boston Globe reported.
The city of Boston requested a temporary restraining order against Lynch in their court filing – attempting to preserve assets in the event of her restaurants being sold to make sure any back taxes would be paid.
Massachusetts