EASTHAM — David and Carolyn Delgizzi will not be allowed to open the Lobster Shanty this summer because they haven’t paid their taxes. The select board voted unanimously on May 20 to deny the family’s food and liquor licenses for the Route 6 restaurant until the Delgizzis pay over $70,000 in back taxes owed on their eight Eastham properties.
The family has owned the Lobster Shanty building since the 1980s, when real estate investor Daniel Delgizzi bought the property from a local family. Daniel’s son David and David’s wife, Carolyn, inherited the business. They also own more than 30 other properties across Massachusetts and nearly 100 units of rundown housing on Cape Cod. The Delgizzis live in Weston.
According to Eastham Treasurer-Collector Maya Golding, state law allows municipalities to deny any kind of business license if a person, corporation, or enterprise has neglected to pay their taxes. Denied licenses “shall not be reissued until a licensing authority receives a certificate issued by the tax collector that the party is in good standing with respect to any and all local taxes,” the law reads.
Golding’s records show that the Delgizzis owe the town $70,300 in property taxes from 2023 and 2024. Golding wrote in a May 9 email to the select board that the Delgizzi’s Eastham properties are currently in tax title status, and the town will move to foreclose on those properties in August if payment is not made.
The Delgizzis are notorious tax delinquents, as the Independent has reported. Last month, the Internal Revenue Service seized two Delgizzi properties in Orleans because David Delgizzi owed over $2 million in state and federal income taxes and failed to appear in U.S. District Court. The Delgizzis owe Truro over $500,000 for their five properties there, which have all been placed in tax title.
Records at the Barnstable County Registry of Deeds show that Eastham placed all eight of the Delgizzis’ remaining properties in town in tax-taking status in February for a total of $25,978, including interest. Two other Delgizzi condominiums on Route 6 were seized by the town in 2020 for unpaid taxes dating back to 2014.
Those properties are duplexes, and the Delgizzis still own the adjoining units. As a result, the town has struggled to get its half of each building into habitable condition. The Delgizzis are up to date on taxes for their units in the duplexes, town records show.
Along with the Lobster Shanty, the Delgizzis own the Lobster Pound in Orleans. That restaurant closed during the pandemic and has not reopened. Orleans Treasurer-Collector Scott Walker told the Independent last summer that the Delgizzis stopped paying their property taxes after the restaurant closed. Yet town officials said they were aware of people living inside the restaurant, which has no bedrooms.
“It’s strange, because they used to focus a lot of attention on their restaurants,” Eastham Town Manager Jacqui Beebe told the Independent. Beebe added that there’s still the possibility the Delgizzis might pay up. In 2019, they paid the town $130,000 for years of unpaid property taxes, she said.
At the same time that the Delgizzis have had some of their properties seized for unpaid taxes, they continue to acquire more. Two weeks ago, they purchased a $900,000 home at 52 Baker Road in Brewster, a May 21 deed shows.
The Delgizzis bought three other Brewster properties in 2019 and 2020. That was around the same time that Eastham took the two duplexes on Route 6, and Truro took the Delgizzis to housing court over living conditions at the 35-unit Truro Motor Inn.
The Delgizzis did not respond to requests for comment on this story. A call to the Lobster Shanty disconnected; an online entry for the Lobster Shanty reads “permanently closed.”