Boston will have to live menos for awhile: City's only Taco Bell ordered shut for licensing mixup

The Boston Licensing Board yesterday ordered the Taco Bell at 1560 VFW Parkway in West Roxbury shut because its corporate owners in Tennessee failed to pay for a 2017 food-serving license.

The franchisee has already applied for a new license, although a hearing date on the request has yet to be set, board Chairwoman Christine Pulgini said.

The shutdown was strictly because the Taco Bell - which also serves Long John Silver's fish-based offerings - never responded to the renewal letters the board sent out last October and let its license expire, not because of an incident in May in which the restaurant manager refused to let two Boston Police detectives in for an inspection, she said. The Taco Bell is owned by a franchisee in Tennessee.

Until the Taco Bell re-opens, Bostonians and Dedhamites - who can get to the location more easily than Bostonians - will have to go elsewhere for taco-like food items. The closest taco places without turning around on the parkway are Pancho's in Dedham Center and Los Amigos on Centre Street in West Roxbury. Somebody willing to endure the turnaround at Spring Street can get to the Chipotle near the Five Guys in Dedham.

At a hearing Tuesday, two detectives testified they drove up to the take-out window around midnight to conduct an inspection after hearing the place's license had not been renewed. They flashed their blue lights and showed their badges, then drove around to the front entrance, closed at the time. Instead of letting them in, the eatery manager did as he was trained and called his manager - who eventually agreed he should let the detectives in.

At the hearing, detectives and Pulgini said the franchisee should train workers to call 911 first, rather than a manager, in part because city law requires food-serving establishments to always let police in for inspections.