Store owner blames city for loss of business

By Kim Kinrade - The Weekly News
A thriving little business was forced to close its doors when HRM closed off its street for repairs. But Cubano's Minimarket owner Noelvis Rochela wants people to know he's not closed for good and will reopen on June 22.
This was the second time the Thistle Street store has had to deal with road construction in the past year and a half.
And the resilient store owner feels that is just too much. This time around he was given only a week's notice.
On April 17, Rochela received a letter with an HRM seal that Thistle Street would be closed for the replacement of water pipes beginning April 27.
"On April 24, three days early, crews showed up and converted Thistle Street to one-way traffic," Rochela explained. "From then on, dust was getting in everywhere and no people were coming in the store."
He put up with the empty, dusty store for two weeks before throwing in the towel and giving the unspoiled food to a local food bank.
Housed in a building that was once the home of a convenience store, Cubano's Minimarket has bucked the trends by offering up kiwi fruit and bananas, where there was once cigarettes and candy.
He said Dartmouth High students still go into the location, but are now coming out with fruit drinks or a couple of apples.
That was before the road construction.
Rochela has calculated approximately $8,000 in lost revenue so far. He has spoken with persons in the city's claims department and they have helped him file a claim for lost revenue and spoiled produce.
According to Shaune MacKinlay, manager of public affairs for HRM, a person has the right to seek redress through claims, but this isn't the typical type of claim they see. She goes on to say out of the approximate 1,000 claims the city gets per year, most involve injury or property damage.
"Very seldom do we get claims due to loss of business from construction on a street. It's an unfortunate consequence for fixing and repairing municipal roads," said MacKinlay.
In August 2007, only two months after Cubano's first opened its doors, new street lights were installed on the corner of Thistle Street and Victoria Road and the resulting turmoil cost him thousands of baskets of strawberries.
"I ordered the strawberries because of demand and when they put in the lights I lost all that business," he remembered. "The strawberries all had to go in the garbage."
Rochela admits that Coun. Jim Smith's office has been helpful, especially after he sent them 30 pictures of his dusty store and the ruined produce. As spring and fall are the best seasons for his business most of the spring season has already been wasted.
He said he has received hundreds of emails from his customers asking him for a reopening date, and he appreciates the support.
Although the street was reopened temporarily, the work wasn't completed and Rochela feels that by June 22 the work crews will have gone completely and the street repaved. He doesn't want to open earlier only to have the road shut down again for three days of paving and lose more money in ruined fruit and vegetables.
kim.kinrade@ns.sympatico.ca