A City Council member from Lincoln Park wants to throw a financial bone to Chicago restaurants fighting for survival by allowing them to serve patrons who bring in their dogs — without fear of being fined.

Ald. Timmy Knudsen (43rd) said he drafted the ordinance at the behest of a Clark Street cafe owner whose eat-in French bakery was tied up for hours by “back-to-back” city inspections triggered by a patron complaint about the presence of dogs in the eatery.

Right now, Chicago restaurants are prohibited from serving patrons accompanied by dogs — either indoors or outdoors — unless that customer has a service dog.

That’s what happened to Sophie Evanoff, owner of Vanille Patisserie, 2108 North Clark, who found out about the ban the hard way when “someone called the Health Department on us

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