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Transit Hill Plaza businesses coping with fire's aftermath
By John J. Hopkins Times
One week after a fire destroyed two Depew businesses and damaged or temporarily closed six others in Transit Hill Plaza, most stores have reopened for business, but one longtime tenant is still cleaning up with the hopes of reopening next week.
Dennis Casillo, owner of Casillo's Pizza, Subs & Wings, said the fire forced him to discard all of the restaurant's food. Some equipment must be replaced, but he's hoping to be able to retain most of it.
Still, the odor of smoke remained hanging in the air Monday afternoon as Casillo and others were working to clean up his 39-year-old business.
"We lost a lot of product," said Casillo. "It's like starting out all over again. It's going to be a lot of work."
Although the fire didn't burn through the walls, Casillo said the flames scorched a wall in the storage area.
Heavy smoke left almost everything in the restaurant covered in soot. Casillo said that the beige-colored floors "were almost black." As he cleaned Monday, a bucket of darkgray water with a sponge floating on top, sat nearby on the counter.
"Everything has to be gone over, every crack and crevice," Casillo said. "When we move something, we find something else to clean. It's a lot of work. We're going a little at a time."
While the fire was a major shock, Casillo is in an unfamiliar position of being taken away from a sevendays a-week routine he's done for decades.
"It's a little hard," Casillo said. "You're used to nonstop work. I'm trying to get things back in order and get going."
The February 20 blaze started as a grease fire in Sparkee's Grill & Pub at about 9:30 a.m. Sparkee's owner Jim Janiszewski attempted to extinguish the flames, but by the time he retrieved a fire extinguisher, an inferno was raging.
Transit Hill Salon, next door to the tavern, was also destroyed.
According to Depew police and fire reports, damage has been estimated at $705,000, including $500,000 to the structure and $100,000 to the contents at Sparkee's alone.
Other fire damage estimates- all listed as structure and contents combined- include $60,000 to the salon, $20,000 to Casillo's, $10,000 each to Transit Hill Pharmacy and Curves, and $5,000 to Village Liquor Store of Depew.
Transit Hill Plaza owner Dino Fudoli said he expects Janiszewski to look for a new location. The salon, owned by his aunt, may not reopen. All of the remaining businesses in the plaza have reopened.
"My aunt will likely retire," Fudoli said. "I think the bar owner is looking at other locations. That's his livelihood, and he may not be able to wait until we rebuild."
Fudoli, whose father Ralph built the plaza business-by-business beginning in 1951, said he is waiting to hear from his insurance company to determine his family's next move.
The insurance company may suggest razing the damaged portion of the building instead of rebuilding with what's left.
"It's a waiting game now," Fudoli said, adding, "we'd like to rebuild, but right now it's too early to tell."
A fire wall between the salon and Casillo's helped prevent the fire from spreading to the rest of the plaza.
Fudoli said that because the plaza was built business-by-business, there are several fire walls in the structure.
"As a new business was added on, an external wall became an interior wall separating the businesses," Fudoli explained.
The family still owns Ralph's Foodvalu, which was reopened Thursday after an inspection by the New York State Department of Agriculture and the Erie County Health Department.
A Curves exercise center also reopened, despite its status as the only business in the plaza without phone service as of Monday afternoon. Fudoli said Tuesday that the phone lines at Curves had been restored.
Gary Frankish was still waiting Monday afternoon for a new door to be installed at Village Liquor, which is owned by his wife, Monica.
Firefighters smashed through the glass door to search for pockets of fire that may have reached the store. Cleaning up the glass took "a couple of hours," Frankish said.
A hint of smoke remains, but Frankish said the odor should dissipate when the business receives a thorough cleaning. In the mean time, "I'm telling customers that it's my new cologne."
The store did not have phone service until Saturday, which Frankish said harmed lottery and credit card sales because both services use telephone lines to complete transactions. His regular lottery customers, he added, were happy to learn that the service was available again.
"Mega (Millions jackpot) was up to 270 million Friday," Frankish noted. "On a day like that I can expect to have 1,000 to 1,500 customers. We lost all of those."
While many neighboring businesses were already open for the day when the fire broke out, Frankish had not arrived at the plaza to open the liquor store. As he approached Transit Road, he was stopped by police, who had closed the state highway. Frankish drove to a nearby Tops supermarket, and walked the remaining distance to the plaza.
"I was thinking about how we'd (inventory) everything if the business went up" in flames, Frankish said.
Frankish reopened the store Thursday morning, but heat wasn't restored until nearly 5 p.m.
At the opposite end of the plaza from Sparkee's, David LaRotonda, who owns Step Ahead Shoe Services with Brian Kirst, was allowed to reopen by 2 p.m., less than five hours after the fire started.
LaRotonda said he and Kirst noticed an odor of smoke and a customer who had just entered the store said the plaza was on fire.
"We went outside and saw all the black smoke," LaRotonda recalled. "We pulled out our file cabinets. It was scary."
The two also removed shoes they were repairing. Employees from a nearby plumbing store helped move the file cabinets.
LaRotonda praised firefighters for their performance.
"They did a great job," LaRotonda said. "We thought the whole plaza was going to be gone."
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