The end of an era at Pablo Plaza (This article was an especially tough one to write, since I personally knew most of the men and women who worked at Ellen’s Kitchen, Concept Cutters and Monkey’s Uncle Tavern since our home is a few blocks away. Most of the stores and businesses found new locations on the north end of the beaches, but it was hard to see them go. The price of progress, I guess.)
The remaining original tenants at the Pablo Plaza Shopping Center – Monkey’s Uncle Tavern, Concept Cutters hair salon and Rahaim’s Walls and Floors – will be moving over the next five months as center owner Equity One Inc. makes plans for an $18 million renovation.
All received eviction notices or were put on verbal notice a few weeks ago, after each made the shopping center home for 30 years.
Ellen’s Kitchen, a popular local breakfast and lunch diner, has also been notified that it has to be out by early 2016, while Bagel World, sandwiched next to Panera Bread and a convenience store, has already closed its doors.
Owners and managers of the stores voiced sadness at having to leave after so many years, irritation that the property owners are forcing the moves during the most profitable time of year for retailers and lamented that their small businesses are given short shrift compared to the big box stores set to take their places at the center.
And most are now scrambling to find new properties where they can reopen nearby.
Ken Rahaim Juro, owner of Rahaim’s Walls & Floors, plans to be out by the end of October, but he won’t be at the Beaches. Juro is moving his store to 3216 Clermont Road near Emerson Street, a family home where he once lived in the early ’60s.
Read more at: https://www.jacksonville.com/story/news/2015/09/17/merchants-being-evicted-pablo-plaza-shopping-center/15680182007/