RESTAURANT OWNERS IN THE SOUP OVER HOUSE BOUGHT FOR WORKERS

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 5, 1992                   TAG: 9202050352
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MARK LAYMAN STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium
RESTAURANT OWNERS IN THE SOUP OVER HOUSE BOUGHT FOR WORKERS
It was only four months ago that Jude Ying and his partner, Teddy Yang, opened the Mai Tai restaurant on Brambleton Avenue near Virginia 419 in Southwest Roanoke County.
They've made a lot of friends at the restaurant since then. It isn't unusual to see a line of customers waiting for tables during the daily lunch buffet, which features General Tso's spicy chicken and more than a dozen other dishes.
But when Ying and his partner bought a house for their employees on Pilot Boulevard, a two-minute drive from the Mai Tai, they didn't get a friendly welcome from their neighbors.
In fact, a dozen of their neighbors showed up at Tuesday's meeting of the county Planning Commission to complain that the restaurateurs were "warehousing" employees at the brick ranch house, which has a small attic and a basement.
"At present, it's not a problem . . . as far as creating a disturbance," Ralph Sheets told the Planning Commission. But by his count - which the restaurateurs dispute - there are at least 19 people living there. Neighbors fear that might grow to 50, 75, even 100 people, he said.
They want the county to adopt an ordinance that limits the number of unrelated people who can live in a house in a single-family residential zoning district. Blacksburg adopted such an ordinance in the early 1980s.
"We've got nothing against these people," said O.T. Angle, who lives next to the house. "It's what they're doing to the neighborhood." And without a limit on the number of unrelated people who can live in a house, "they can do it in any neighborhood."
And what, exactly, are the restaurant employees doing to the neighborhood?
Causing a lot of talk and suspicion, mostly.
"We do not know these people well enough" to be sure what they are up to, Sheets said.
"We can't even get anyone to check to see if they're illegal aliens or if they're being paid minimum wage," another neighbor said.
Thirty neighborhood residents met Sunday with Supervisor Fuzzy Minnix and the county's planning director, Terry Harrington. They also have asked for help from Rep. Jim Olin and U.S. Sens. John Warner and Charles Robb.
There has even been talk of holding a demonstration outside the Mai Tai.
"They assured us there was no racial or ethnic thing involved," Minnix said Tuesday. "They were just concerned about their property values, the traffic. . . . They're pretty upset about it."
Ying and Yang seem puzzled by the fuss.
They say it started with Angle. "I don't understand why he has this thing [against us]," Yang said. "This is America. . . . I've been to many places. I have never seen a Mr. Angle."
Many Chinese restaurant owners buy small houses for their employees to live in rent-free, Ying said. "We call it a `dormitory.' " Usually, only six or eight people spend the night at the house, he said. "I don't allow strangers to sleep over."
Ying's wife and children live in Lexington, but on most nights, "I sleep here because I want the people to behave," he said. "If they want to party, they go somewhere else."
Not all of his employees are American citizens, he said. "But they have papers. We do not hire illegals."
So far, Ying has had only one problem with the county: failing to get a building permit when he began to remodel the house.
He and his partner have a quarter-century's combined experience in the restaurant business. They count most of the other Chinese restaurant owners in the Roanoke Valley as friends - if not relatives.
Yang's sister owns the China Gate Restaurant on Williamson Road; his father owned the Egg Roll House on Brandon Avenue. Yang came to the U.S. in 1976 and worked in New York, Louisiana, Texas and elsewhere before settling in Roanoke with his wife and children.
Ying owns Chinese restaurants in Lexington and Bedford. He grew up in Brazil, where his father was a businessman, and came to the United States in 1974. He earned a master's degree in international business from the University of South Carolina and worked for Texas Instruments before going into the restaurant business.
"We both come from good families," Ying said. "Money doesn't mean too much to us. . . . We are happy to make the customers happy. What's important is the service, not the money we're making."
Even though the Mai Tai is doing well, he and his partner have learned one important lesson from the experience, he said.
"Next time we buy a house, we ask the neighbors first."

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB