wherein the smoke shop is in danger of disappearing (literally and physically)

[edenfalling]

Let me tell you all the things that are wrong with the smoke shop.

No, wait, that would take forever. So let's just talk about the physical building.

A couple months back, the owners of the building (a local real estate company) announced that, in partnership with Cornell and the City of Ithaca, they were opening a business incubator on the second floor. (Presumably that is why they refused to renew the lease of the Advocacy Center, which only does non-profit things like helping victims of domestic and sexual and childhood abuse, rather than building shiny new internet apps -- why yes, I'm slightly bitter about that, how ever could you tell???) Of course, in order to do that, they needed to renovate the second floor. They also plan to add a third floor -- maybe even a fourth floor -- on top of the building in 2015.

So far, no problem.

Then we hear that A) they will need to install an elevator, and B) oh shit, during the demolition phase of the renovation process, they found asbestos.

Yeah.

And this was after they'd spent several days chucking debris out the open second floor windows into a dumpster in the back alley... which happens to be where we keep our recycling and trash until the designated days for curbside pickup, and also where we get our newspaper deliveries every morning.

They ran some tests and determined that the alley debris was not, in fact, contaminated, but even so. Fun times! They have been removing the asbestos from the second floor -- and also from the basement, where whoops, they found some more! -- over the past few days. This involves a bunch of plastic sheeting and air pressure regulators and masks and stuff... but the smoke shop (and the outdoor gear shop and the yarn shop) have not had any precautionary measures installed, so we're all a little suspicious of that.

And today, a pair of architects came by to measure the store in preparation for the elevator... which, when I asked them, is apparently supposed to sit right beside the basement stairwell, in the middle of the smoke shop's back room, with a little access foyer to the back alley that runs right through our bathroom. I asked them what we were going to do for a bathroom during and after the construction. I got nothing but blank looks and "Um, well, I don't know" in response. And that's not even getting into the loss of space, which will probably not come with any corresponding reduction of rent.

Furthermore, I am pretty sure that if the second floor had asbestos, and the basement had asbestos, they will also find asbestos on the ground floor -- i.e., in the smoke shop -- once they start cutting apart walls for the elevator shaft, and then we'll get outright shut down for at least a week, and where the hell are we supposed to move all our stock? Mr. Speakerphone has already told Boss Lady to basically quit ordering new stock until we get straight answers from the owners and the architects, since he strongly suspects we'll have to abandon ship at some point, possibly forever. And if we get kicked out, I'm pretty sure he's not going to reopen the smoke shop elsewhere. He'll just close it altogether.

And then what am I going to do for a job?

So yeah, that's some stuff I've been worrying about for the past few weeks. :-(

Comments

[heliopausa]

I am very sorry indeed to hear about this, and that it's been on your back for some time. :( I hope that you get a time of calm to look about you to see what opportunities are offering.

[edenfalling]

Oh god, a time of calm. I would love a time of calm. Since last summer, I keep thinking I've reached one, and then after a max of two weeks it all goes to hell again. *wilts*

[lexicology]

Awwwgh, that sounds so sucky and frustrating! You have my sympathies.

[edenfalling]

Thank you. It is indeed sucky and frustrating, particularly on top of the staffing problems that have been an ongoing issue (in one form or another) since last summer. We are all stressed and overworked and not dealing very well with any added uncertainty. :-(

[branchandroot]

O_O What a godawful mess. And, yeah, a lot of that really does sound very skeevy on the part of the building owner. Time to start looking around for different jobs, perhaps? Not that this is fun in the current economy, but at least you've got cast iron references and a nice, long employment period for your resume.

[edenfalling]

Yeah, one of the property owners (the company is a two-person partnership, I believe) came in today and gave some more firm dimensions about the area they're planning to use to build the elevator... AND another stairwell that will go up to the second floor and then the new third (and potential fourth) floors as well, because I guess using the existing staircase is somehow bad and wrong and impossible. *headdesk* They're basically going to steal half our back room/office space, and a chunk of our actual store as well. And we got blank looks from him, too, on the "If you're destroying our bathroom, where the hell are we going to pee?" question, which is not a good sign.

...

I need to update my resume.

[lady_songsmith]

Oh, man. That's rough, and lots of hugs for you. I hope it works out -- but maybe time to start looking around for who might be hiring?

[edenfalling]

*is hugged* Yeah, I need to update my resume, and also finish my reapplication to college, because this is getting ridiculous and untenable.

[askerian]

oh hell, what a clusterfuck. i'm so sorry. that's pretty worrying, yeah! ;__;

[edenfalling]

Clusterfuck is a good description, yes. *melts into stress puddle*

[redwolf]

::sigh:: I love architecture. The problem is that the vast majority of architects are the rocket scientists you've just met.

Wasn't there an old defunct elevator shaft in the building that filled up with water? Or is this in addition to that one? Or I'm possibly imagining things.

I'm worried about the idiots removing the asbestos. They should have cleared the building.

I would have thought a smoke shop was a community essential, making it a business always in need. But I don't know the area and I'm not the one who has to deal with the expense of shifting a business. The not knowing if the business has a future is massively stressful.

Good luck with getting a new job or a new location or a functioning bathroom.

[edenfalling]

The thing about that elevator shaft is that it's only a... well, a basic platform, to take deliveries from the alley down to the basement. No walls, just a floor and some cables. And it exists in a sort of notch cut into the building, so if they extended the shaft upwards A) they'd have to enclose the whole thing, and B) the elevator doors would open directly onto the alley, which is a security nightmare. You want an entry foyer of some sort, with a lockable normal door, and then the elevator at least, say, six to ten feet into the building. So the basement lift is unsuitable for their purposes.

They wrapped the relevant areas up in plastic sheeting and had machines producing negative air pressure (so any breaches would suck in rather than blow out), but yeah, even so, it seems a bit lackadaisical to me.

There are other tobacco shops in Ithaca (though none with quite the same stock as close to the Commons). There are also other places to buy books, candy, snacks, drinks, coffee & coffee beans, and greeting cards. You can even buy magazines from Barnes & Noble (if you can get all the way out to Rt. 13) or from Buffalo Street Books (if you want esoteric local stuff) or from Wegmans and other grocery stores (if you just want tabloids and/or nothing specialized). So we are not indispensable in any category... though we ARE the only store with that particular mix of items for sale.

The smoke shop has been around in some form for over 115 years. We are currently owned by a news distribution company based in Elmira, about half an hour south of Ithaca -- that is Mr. Speakerphone's main business. We have a sister store down there, in a building Mr. Speakerphone owns, so he does have another outlet for weird magazines if he closes us, and it's one that doesn't come with the build-in expense of paying rent to somebody else.

We got a slightly more detailed estimate of the new elevator space requirements -- which turns out to also involve a new stairwell, because apparently the existing stairwell from the ground floor to the second floor is Bad and Wrong and can't just be duplicated up to further stories. The plan is basically to steal half our back room/office area... which in turn would require us to either store all our stock down in the basement (and I'm not even sure how we'd access the basement, with all the door-moving that would be involved), or to knock out the existing back wall of the store and move it forward, thus stealing retail space and turning it into new office space, since what they'd be leaving us is mostly a tight corridor that wraps around the service lift shaft/alley notch, and is largely taken up by the gigantic industrial AC system (and the ATM) in any case.

We got a secondary sink installed in a former closet back at that end of the back room several years ago, in order to maintain our food processing license for our powdered cappuccino machine, so I suppose we could maybe get the bit of the storage area where we currently keep Coke products and cleaning products turned into a new bathroom -- there is already some piping there, you see -- but I suspect they'll try to fob us off with a bathroom in the basement, like the gear exchange shop is already stuck with, and that sounds like a horrible idea. :-(

[redwolf]

Sounds like old lift is halfway between lift and hoist and possibly has a completely different name to either.

I guess it comes down to what the rental market is like. If it's difficult to get space, the building owner can do what he likes; but if nothing is moving, Mr Speakerphone can set terms that favour him. I wonder if there's anything suitable in the area worth buying as an investment. Not that Mr Speakerphone may be interested in that option. None of which helps you or the rest of the staff.

Speaking from local experience, building construction impacting a rental premises as well any structural or floorspace changes from what's in a rental agreement would definitely either void that contract or make it open to negotiation. You can't just expect tenants to keep paying the same rent if you start removing bedrooms, bathrooms and kitchens from the premises. The owner would end up in legal strife. Laws on your end may weight things differently, but that's also an issue for Mr Speakerphone.

It all does your head in thinking about it.

[willowgreen.livejournal.com]

Well, that sucks on every possible level. On the other hand, downtown Ithaca is not the worst possible place to find a job in retail -- especially for someone with a proven track record of responsibility. But I hope it doesn't come to that!

[edenfalling]

Yeah, it could be worse. And I think I might also go back to Kelly Services and see if I can get some temp secretarial work if the retail jobs don't pan out immediately -- assuming we close, that is. :-/

I really need to update my resume, and get serious about reapplying to college and finishing SOME kind of degree.