Former Shane Furniture on demolition path; effort underway to restore it

ELYRIA — The former Shane Furniture building is on the path to demolition unless the city can find a way to save it. City Council voted Monday night to authorize the city to move forward with abating multiple violations at 327 Broad St. Mayor Frank Whitfield advocated to find a way to save it and have a structural engineer assess it. A local resident also presented her ideas for the building. Building Inspector Darryl Farkas detailed the many code violations inside the building, including the lack of a fire suppression system, partial building collapses and a sub-cellar filled with water. An appeal was not filed by the owners, leaving it up to the city to decide what would come next. When the building was condemned April 12, the owners had 30 days to appeal. In March, the Building Department received permission from a Howard Hanna agent to inspect the inside of the building. The department cannot inspect the inside of a building without permission. It can only inspect from the public right of way. The building was deemed unsafe to the general public and a notice was issued by the city Building Department. If City Council chose not to move forward with abatement and follow Farkas' recommendations, Councilman Phil Tollett, D-at large, questioned whether insurance would keep protecting the city. Law Director Amanda Deery said insurance likely wouldn't drop the city, but she said Elyria would be put in a precarious legal position. However, Deery said the city has received nothing in writing — and would be shocked if they did — that insurance would defend Elyria were something to happen. Farkas said part of the building had collapsed into the alley and some brick also fell on an electrical panel, which Farkas said caused an electrical hazard, particularly with rainfall. Ohio Edison came out and shut down the power. Farkas said the building is unsafe in many aspects, and that it's been in a bad state for years. The electrical panel, located in the subcellar, was almost submerged in water. There's debris throughout the building, from furniture to washers to wood piles. Farkas said it almost looked more like a storage unit. The fire suppression system has been dismantled. Farkas said this is a building the fire department would not enter if a fire broke out, but rather do damage control from the outside. At some point, Farkas said someone likely tried to fix a leak on the roof. The material from one side of the roof was moved to the other side, doubling its weight, and new material was put down. He said that was done without any permits or approval to their knowledge. Based on the water leaks and moldiness, Farkas said it had likely been leaking for quite awhile and had been recently repaired. "It was almost like walking into a cave," he said. "It was so damp and dank. The crystallization on the furniture, it was like something I've never seen." Farkas couldn't answer whether the building is salvageable because he said he's not a structural engineer. He is just a certified inspector. In his decades of experience, Farkas said the building is a concern for adjacent properties and people of the public. He said there is a danger of brick falling at any time on certain areas of the facade. Assistant Safety Service Director Dawn Calvert said it's clear 327 Broad St. is a safety and fire hazard. She said the administration looked at two recommendations: learn the cost to stabilize the building from a structural engineer and support the community in getting a feasibility plan with a timeline around resident safety. Hamid Homaee, a principal with KS Associates, has been a structural engineer for 40 years. He said the building needs immediate fire protection and brick stabilization. His recommendation for the structure is to do an inspection and report what the skeleton structure can hold. Homaee said he would look at whether the structure can hold its own weight, withstand the roof load, new architectural upgrades, people and new equipment. But that process would take time, Homaee said. It would also not be cheap to redevelop the building, he said. It's likely to cost millions of dollars. Just to demolish or restore, he said there would be at least nine weeks of structural engineering work needed, and a demolition would need a plan for a building that's complicated to take down, with adjacent structures nearby or attached. Whitfield said that other cities with historic buildings face some of these same issues, and that Elyria should embrace its position. It costs more to develop them, and Whitfield said they have to be creative with it. One resident, Kelly Kraus Mencke, has hopes of restoring the building. Although she doesn't own it yet, she presented her thoughts to City Council. She said she'd like it to be the catalyst for growth downtown. She wants to repurpose it as low-income apartments and retail within three phases. The first phase would be repairing code violations, which she estimated to be $200,000. The second phase would be restoration, which Mencke estimated at $500,000 to $700,000. The third phase would be construction, and Mencke put the total projected cost between $7 million to $8 million. She said the project would phase over three to five years. Some of those specific costs would be $5,000 for the roof, $30,000 for electrical and $40,000 to $125,000 for fire and life safety repairs. Mencke said she got those estimates from quotes from contractors. She said she's received support from the Lorain County Historical Society and Heritage Ohio. Blank Slate Elyria has come on as a partner, and Mencke is looking for Elyria, Lorain County, the Cleveland Housing Network and state of Ohio to potentially come on board. Councilman Kenny Oswald, D-4th Ward, said he doesn't want to see the building come down. However, he said restoring the building is a huge undertaking that he wasn't certain Mencke could get the financing for. Before it was Shane Furniture, the building was a JCPenney and before that it was the Lewis Mercantile Co. It is currently owned by Julius Schionhiutt and was recently moved to a limited liability corporation. Schionhiutt's son, Adam, has said they'd like to sell the building to someone who can do something with it. It's currently listed for sale on Howard Hanna for $60,000. Council President Vic Stewart, D-at large, said Council would like plans to work out, but there's also safety for residents to keep in mind. Stewart said he would like to see netting go up around the building in the meantime. Some caution tape had originally gone up as part of Farkas' order, but Farkas said it got taken down and he's not sure why. Whitfield said his administration will continue down the path of investigating restoration of the building while the process for demolition gets started. The next steps will be to contract with a structural engineer and bid out the project for demolition. Contact Laina Yost at (440) 329-7121 or lyost@chroniclet.com.