Simon’s is MIA as its plans for Collinwood grocery property remain unknown

It’s been almost nine months since the closure of Dave’s grocery location on Lakeshore Blvd. in Collinwood, making it more difficult for residents to access fresh, healthy foods. Since then, Dave’s has run shuttle service to its Euclid location, with mixed responses from Collinwood residents. When Simon’s purchased the vacant Lakeshore Blvd. grocery property in September, hopes rose that the neighborhood would once again be home to a full-service grocery. Now, residents are frustrated as Simon’s has failed to respond to inquiries or communicate about its intentions for the property.

A community meeting was held at the Collinwood Community Center on Nov. 17. Chaired by Delores Hewston, the meeting included speakers such as Joseph Janes, owner of several Save A Lot locations in the Greater Cleveland area, as well as representatives from the 5^th police district. Ward 8 Cleveland City Council member Mike Polensek was also present at the event. While the first speakers focused on different topics – with Janes speaking about improvements to Save A Lot service and 5^th district representatives encouraging members to report crime and be vigilant – the discussion soon shifted to the main topic: Simon’s Supermarkets, and the building which Dave’s Market once occupied.

Hewston said that she invited the grocer, Simon Hussain, to the meeting, but he canceled at the last minute. Hussain also declined to speak with The Land for this article. Meanwhile, Polensek shared rumors that Simon’s intends to flip the property for profit rather than open it as a grocery store. (Qasim Properties LLC, a company tied to the owners of Simon’s, purchased the property from Montlack for $1.3 million in September. The public can search Cuyahoga County property transfers at the county website by searching for an address or owner and then selecting “Transfers.”)

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Residents are uncertain about Simon’s

At the November meeting, Polensek stated that he was informed by Hanna Commercial Real Estate that Simon’s was looking to flip the property, wanting “$1 million” more than the company purchased it for in September. The councilman expressed a lack of faith and said he was “disappointed” with Simon’s. Randy Markowitz, vice president of Hanna Commercial Real Estate, told The Land in December that Simon’s was approached by another entity asking if Simon’s would consider selling the property. “I have all indications that Simon’s is set on this property,” Markowitz said.

During the meeting, Hewston and several community members spoke of previous bad experiences in Simon’s stores, particularly the one on E. 152^nd St. in South Collinwood, two miles away from the closed Dave’s location. While Hewston said that the store was “cleaner” after one discussion with Hussain, she bemoaned his decision not to come to the community meeting. 

The Simon’s supermarket on E. 152^nd in South Collinwood was previously cited with critical and non-critical violations by the Cleveland Health Department in May and September 2022, which Polensek brought up during the meeting. (The store’s January 2023 inspection found no violations. The public can search health code violations at the Cleveland Health Department site by clicking on “Food Facility Inspections” on the left side of the site and entering an entity name or street in the search box.) Community members complained of lackluster standards by several other companies in the area, with Dollar General and Dollar Tree specifically mentioned as examples.

“We’re not about to financially support a low-end glorified Dollar Tree,” Polensek warned at the meeting. “We’ve had to have Dollar General cited. We’ve had to have Family Dollar on 105^th shut down for health violations. We’re not accepting this low-end stuff that somehow people think they can impose on us on the east side of the city.” (A December 2022 follow-up health department inspection of the Family Dollar at 1250  E. 105th St. found continued violations, including dirty shelving, a dead mouse, and evidence of live rodents.) 

Community engagement in grocery store decisions

One of the community members who attended the Collinwood community meeting was Lemar D. McKenzie Sr., pastor of True Holiness Church Of God in Christ, a church on Macauley Ave. in Collinwood. McKenzie said that his congregation, for the most part, has been adapting to the Dave’s closure and has the means to seek other options, such as the Dave’s at Shore Center in Euclid. He was worried that if Simon’s sold the property, residents might become apathetic and once again need to adjust. “They’ll just say, ‘Okay, here’s another example of people doing what they want, and they don’t care about us.’ It would have a serious impact … [residents] might just not care no more,” he said. 

McKenzie suggested that members of the community should form a committee and campaign for better conditions in a collective effort. “And [people will] begin to see that the group has numbers, and that group has power, rather than just individual voices complaining,” he said. 

Roger Sikes, program manager at the Cuyahoga County Board of Health, helped land Simon’s in another location, Euclid’s Ward 3, several years ago, when at the time it was a food desert. “We had done some coalition building, particularly in Ward 3, a lower-income area within the city of Euclid,” Sikes told The Land. Much of his work, such as coalition-building, was done through the Creating Healthy Communities program, which is part of the Ohio Department of Health and funds food access and active living efforts in 22 counties across Ohio. “We had done a fair amount of focus groups and surveys in that neighborhood asking about different quality of life issues and so we had an awareness that in that neighborhood some of the primary issues among residents were access to quality affordable food and also access to living wage jobs.”

In that case, Sikes was approached by the late Paul Beno, formerly a zoning administrator in Euclid, who he says was aware of Hussain’s plans for a store. Sikes informed him. “That’s when I connected with Simon Hussain to talk about the project and get a better understanding of what he’s trying to do. From there we started up a long, multi-year journey,” said Sikes. 

Community interest in access to groceries was a driver for high engagement by residents of Ward 3. According to Sikes, Simon’s was heavily involved as well. “Simon [Hussain] was coming to these forums, and he was hearing some things from residents, and he probably felt, what I would call, a healthy tension to kind of deliver on promises,” he said. Since then, Simon’s has expanded operations to several more locations, and Sikes explained that the Covid-19 pandemic stretched the health department, leading to less involvement in grocery stores.

Meanwhile, Polensek has not been impressed with Simon’s. “I was just at another meeting at the high-rises last week,” Polensek told The Land in late December. “When you mention Simon’s, they don’t want it. Not based on their experience with the Simon’s at Five Points (South Collinwood).” He says he received complaints about outdated products and the smell, among other things. 

He also stressed that he’d heard nothing from Simon’s regarding the sale of the property besides information from Hanna Real Estate. “They’re a private business, so if they want to be clandestine or secretive about their plans, I guess that’s their privilege. I can’t control that, the city can’t control that, but we can control our financial assistance, and we’re not going to support any business that goes in that location that is not a quality operation,” he said. (In order to make the finances of urban grocery stores work, cities sometimes offer companies financial incentives. Such assistance was offered to Dave’s last spring in exchange for staying put, but Dave’s declined.)

Polensek mentioned the Save A Lot on Neff Rd. as a good example of a quality store, citing extensive work on the site and improvements in quality, something other residents at the community meeting had also noted.

Sikes suggested that Simon’s could benefit from more engagement with the community, such as he saw when he helped bring the company to Euclid’s Ward 3. “We need Simon and his store staff and leadership to really listen, kind of humble themselves, and vice versa with Simon being able to share its perspectives with the community,” he said. 

He also noted, however, that this would be easier said than done. “You want a quality grocery store to thrive, and the sweet spot is if Simon is meeting these expectations, then hopefully more residents will shop there and then there can be some synergy there,” Sikes said. He believes that positive outcomes from the sale will depend on whether Simon’s is willing to engage the Collinwood community further. “That’s not necessarily how most grocery stores operate, but I do think it’s a helpful thing, and it helps for grocery stores to be more responsive and relevant,” he said. 

As of this month, Polensek was still unprepared to send city funds to assist Simon’s in opening a Lakeshore Blvd. store at the old Dave’s location. “They would have to come up with a completely different concept, a [different] way they run their stores before I would even consider supplying any city funding for that,” he said. Polensek indicated a similar position from Mayor Bibb.

“Collinwood residents deserve convenient access to high quality groceries,” Jeff Epstein, the mayor’s chief of integrated development, told The Land, “and the City is committed to work with the councilman and community to achieve this goal.”

Update: This story was updated on 1/21/2023 to include the response from Mayor Bibb’s office.