El Patio demolition to start Tuesday

LORAIN — After years of waiting, residents on the city's southside will finally see an end to El Patio. The long-vacant former restaurant at 2933 Grove Ave. is slated for demolition today. C&J Contractors Inc., of Cleveland, brought in an excavator Monday afternoon and plans to start tearing into the building this morning. The demo will cost the city $47,740 in Community Development Block Grants. Councilman Rey Carrion, D-Ward 6, was happy to see the demolition move forward, as blighted properties are part of what has crippled South Lorain. "Blighted structures no longer producing, no longer viable, they take away from a community," Carrion said. "Not only from an economic development position, from a sense of pride in a community and buildings like this they slowly dwarf just the hope that people have in this community. So to see this, this is really a sign of progress." The project was approved under former Mayor Joe Koziura in December. It was added to the city's demo list in November. Carrion estimated it is the city's first demolition in 2020 — and hopefully not the last. Mayor Jack Bradley would like to see a supermarket rebuild on the corner, as that area is considered a food desert. Once El Patio is down, Bradley said the city will set its sights on other "eyesores" in the city. "This is our gateway, and we want to make sure that when people enter the city of Lorain, they're not seeing eyesores like this," he said. "So this is a first step, certainly not the last step, and there are government funds available to do these things, it's just that you have to go through the proper procedures to get it done." Patrons and workers at Giovanni's Pizza across the street will have a front-row seat for Tuesday's work. Bradley said its owners deserve to see El Patio torn down, after its owners put so much effort into rebuilding their current location. Giovanni's Pizza employee Pamela Thomson would agree. She said workers and patrons alike are glad to see the building razed, having had to look at it since Giovanni's built there three years ago. Last fall, it circulated a petition to bring the building down. Ty Bontempt, a foreman with C&J Contractors said it would take two to three hours to get the building down. Official estimates are two weeks for the project to be cleared, including hauling away debris. He said he would do a final walk-through today before starting demolition, to make sure no one was squatting and as many animals as possible were out of the building. People had been feeding feral cats in the property. More than $62,400 in taxes are owed on the property, according to the county auditor's website. It has racked up delinquent utility charges since at least 2010, also according to the county auditor. Built in 1905, the property was originally a grocery store and meat market until 1942. It has been known as El Patio since the early 1990s. The property caught fire in 2011 while rooms in it were being rented to veterans and is estimated by locals to be vacant since then. Contact Carissa Woytach at (440) 329-7245 or cwoytach@chroniclet.com. Follow her on Twitter @CWoytach.