Things are rapidly souring for the Gourmet Cherry Hill Market.
Last week, the Department of Buildings (DOB) slapped a stop work order on all construction inside the Lundy’s landmark building at 1901 Emmons Avenue after an audit found that the retail food component of the proposed new business violates existing zoning regulations.
Cherry Hill now has just a few precious days left to address the violation or face the revocation of their DOB application.
“No retail food establishments are allowed in the Sheepshead Bay Special District,” said Community Board 15 Chair Theresa Scavo. “If they were in the right, the DOB would have not issued the stop work order.”
The new Lundy’s tenants were already grappling with a separate stop work order from the Landmarks Preservation Commission which prevented them from completing work on a tiled sidewalk and the exterior of the building when the DOB served them with their own stop work order on October 14.
“The special district was the result of unflagging and persistent advocacy to preserve and enhance the character of the Sheepshead Bay community,” State Senator Carl Kruger said. “If you chip away at it, and chip away at it some more, there’ll be no special district left to preserve.”
Lundy’s landlord Steve Pappas called the rap against his Cherry Hill tenant “ridiculous.”
“It’s going to be a restaurant,” he told the Bay News. “However, they will be selling some of the stuff that they make inside. I don’t really see the difference. I don’t know why they consider this to be different from what it used to be. As far as I’m concerned there is no problem there.”
When the Bay News visited Lundy’s a little over a week ago, a man who identified himself as the Cherry Hill manager described the new business as a “gourmet restaurant and a gourmet café.”
According to the DOB, work on the new Lundy’s establishment is 40 percent complete. Cherry Hill has reportedly already sunk anywhere from $2 to $4 million into the project.
“I feel horrible that this man has invested this kind of money,” Scavo said. “But who signed a lease for this kind of market? Go to his other location on 86th [Street] and you can see there are apples, oranges, fruits and vegetables. There are laws you’ve got to follow.”
Kruger predicted that the project “will meet its long-overdue and well-deserved end.”
“I don’t understand why some people are trying their hardest to stop this deal when most of the people welcome it,” Pappas said. “Quality food is being provided. Do they want to have an empty space?”
According to Pappas, it would be a “travesty” if Cherry Hill’s building application is revoked because prior efforts to attract traditional restaurants to move into the Lundy’s space have all failed.
“We are doomed,” he said. “We tried to elicit a restaurant and we always lost money. It’s going to be like this forever. I think they should be ashamed of themselves to try and stop a good situation [like this.]”
