Downtown hit by closures

SANDPOINT - A rash of recent business closures brings the nation's economic woes a little bit closer to home and leaves many wondering if more bad news is on the way.

In the past month, at least five area companies - including four located in downtown Sandpoint - have gone out of business.

Addiction, a high-end used clothing store in Ponderay's Bonner Mall, recently announced it would begin a liquidation process before closing its doors for good in October.

"We started (by selling) online and then we tried the store in the mall to see if it would go, but there just isn't enough business to maintain a store like ours," said Bob Weaver, who co-owns the store with his wife Celah. "The problem is there are not enough bodies that come in this mall."

Perhaps the most high profile closure was Sullivan Homes Idaho, which abruptly went out of business early this month, despite an agreement to build 85 homes at the new Idaho Club.

"The midsize builders, the family home builders, we're in dire straits. People just aren't buying," Todd Sullivan, the company's owner, said after the closure.

Downtown staple Bearweare Graphics, which spent years as a leading printing company, unexpectedly closed late last week. Owner Kathleen Hyde, who also acts as manager of the Downtown Sandpoint Business Association, declined to comment about the closure, but said she would continue her employment with the DSBA

Another downtown business, Packages Plus, announced it was closing last week after months of sagging business.

The building's owner, Spokane-based Rudeen Development, will forgive the rest of the company's lease, which would have run through December, said local representative Stephen Evans.

Evans looked into the idea of renting the Packages Plus space to Babs' Pizzeria, which closed Saturday and is now looking for a new location, but decided instead to expand the building's other tenant, Monarch Mountain Coffee.

"Instead of making the substantial changes that we would have had to, or Babs' would have had to, we decided to give (Monarch Mountain) customers a larger place to hang out and drink coffee in the wintertime," Evans said.

Despite the area's recent economic woes, there is no reason for local business owners to panic, said Amy Little, executive director of the Greater Sandpoint Chamber of Commerce.

"We have a lot of other commercial construction coming into town, so I don't think these closures are an epidemic," Little said. "If you look at the number of businesses that have gone out of business versus the number that have gone into business, I think we still have a fairly strong local economy."

While he is not prepared to throw in the towel on downtown business, Sandpoint City Councilman John Reuter sees large problems with the corridor.

Reuter said the biggest impediment to business growth is the city's parking ordinance, which requires businesses that have either changed usage or undergone significant alterations to maintain a certain amount of off-street parking spaces, depending on the size and function of the business.

"It's natural to have some turnover in downtown, but one of the biggest problems we have is that rules like our parking ordinances make it very hard for people to come in and replace those businesses with new uses," Reuter said.

Reuter recently introduced a set of reforms that would do away with parking requirements for businesses, which he hopes will go before the council in time for the next tourist season.

"The need for the city is to take swift action to both deregulate things that are standing in the way of businesses, like the parking requirements, and to put the public dollars we're investing into downtown where they'll do the most good to spur new businesses," Reuter said.