At some pizzerias, "zone" is a shortening of "calzone," which is what you get when you fold a flat piece of pizza dough over a ricotta cheese mixture to which you can add pizza toppings like sausage, pepperoni or mushrooms.
   At the Jim's Razorback Pizza franchise in the Bella Rosa Commerce Center, 16101 Cantrell Road, Little Rock, "zone" is a four-letter word that represents city interference in the way the restaurant wants to do business.
   Graham Cobb, operations director of the central Arkansas' Jim's Razorback Pizza outlets, has been urging the restaurant's customers to petition city officials to change the center's zoning to allow the restaurant to stay open late.
   In a letter to those "Dear Loyal and Supportive Customers," Cobb writes, "We at Razorback Pizza cannot begin to thank you enough for a fabulous six-month start to our business! Unfortunately, as some of you may have heard, we are experiencing difficulties in dealing with the city of Little Rock and the area in which our building is zoned.
   "The Bella Rosa Commerce Center's hours of operation as determined by the city of Little Rock are 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. As you know, we love to serve our customers and they love to eat Razorback Pizza well past 8 p.m.
   "We will operate regular business hours as listed on the menu [11 a.m.-10 p.m. Monday-Wednesday, 11 a.m.-midnight Thursday-Friday, 10 a.m.-midnight Saturday, 10 a.m.-10 p.m. Sunday] .... I am asking for your vocal support and assistance in changing this zoning ordinance.
   "Please contact the members of the board for the city of Little Rock and the mayor's office to let them know how much you love letting us serve you."
   Cobb did acknowledge, just before cutting away from a reporter to take another call, that he was not aware before the restaurant opened that the zoning would limit the restaurant's hours of operation.
   He said negotiations with the city are still under way and he's optimistic a settlement will eventually be reached, but did not want to make any other formal comment.
   That isn't Tony Bozynski's take on the situation.
   Bozynski, the city's director of the Department of Planning and Development, says the 7 a.m.-8 p.m. hours of operation were attached to the planned zoning development process approved by the city Planning Commission when the center project first came up.
   The center is zoned approximately 10 percent for commercial use, including restaurant and retail; occupying the remaining 90 percent are supposed to be mini-storage units and offices, for which, Bozynski explains, the hours of operation are appropriate.
   The Planning Commission initially approved the pizzeria's application to change the center's operating hours, Bozynski says, and brought the recommendation to the city Board of Directors, which rejected the change "several meetings ago."
   He said there had been some opposition from area residents. A planned residential development just south of the center isn't built yet, but there are some neighboring single-family homes along Cantrell Road.
   Bozynski says, regarding the pizzeria's continuing to stay open late into the evening, "Right now, they're in violation of the planned hours." Nobody knows yet what that means in terms of enforcement.
   City Attorney Tom Carpenter says the pizzeria's only avenue of appeal right now is to Pulaski County Circuit Court. "That's about it," he says.
   This is the second case in eight months involving a restaurateur losing a head-butting case with the city on the zoning-andhours issue.
   In November 2005, Pancho's Villa owner Nancy C. Johnson, who had relocated from North Little Rock to an old house that had been a restaurant and grocery store at 600 Tyler St., in Hillcrest, had planned to stay open until 9 p.m.
   But because the restaurant was in a residential neighborhood and its evening business would infringe on its neighbors' parking spaces, the zoning required the restaurant to close at 6:30 p.m. That same hours-of-operation clause had doomed the previous restaurant occupying the space.
   Johnson chose not to appeal the Planning Commission's Nov. 10 decision to the mayor and city board. She eventually gave up and relocated again -- to Jacksonville. Dish is a monthly look at the business end of the central Arkansas restaurant business. Send ideas, notices of new restaurant openings, closings, menu and staff changes to Restaurants, Weekend Section, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, P.O. Box 2221, Little Rock, Ark. 72203; call (501) 399-3667 ; or send e-mail to:
   

eharrison@arkansasonline.com

This story was published Friday, July 07, 2006