Businesses Begin to Reopen After Washington Avenue Blaze

Eleven days after ., has re-opened.

The small coffee shop run by Soraya Meer, was re-opened yesterday after a week of cleaning. One unit closer to the site of the blaze sits a Boost Mobile store that is still shuttered due to water damage from the firefighting efforts.

Meer, who initially opened Coffee Bites last July, said she was simply happy to open the doors again.

“I'm just so relieved,” she said. “It's even more exciting than when we first opened. It's just a relief.”

An employee of Meers', who lives within shouting distance of the shop, called her the night of the fire.

“One of my employees rang me up to tell me the firemen were breaking in,” Meers said. “I dashed out of bed and came and had a look. It was devastating, it really was. It was mostly unknown. You just didn't know what was happening. The flames were just everywhere, the firemen – it was just devastating.”

But Meers said it could have been far worse. With money tight and the business just holding on, she said that she'd let her insurance policy lapse. Damage to the shop ended up being limited to a front window broken by entering firefighters, a bit of water, and a lot of soot.

“I'm going to get insurance,” she said. “My parents completely told me off and I'm very, very thankful to God that I did not get badly damaged. If it had been major? I don't know. I would have cried a whole lot.”

But the Boost Mobile shop one store closer to the site of the fire didn't do as well. Owners Alex and Serge, who both declined to give their last names, were clearing out their store's merchandise in preparation for a large-scale restoration. Water from firefighting efforts in the apartments above soaked the store's walls, making mold a potential hazard. Alex said that at this point, without knowing if what's left of the 816 building is structurally sound or how much damage their store actually received, they don't know how long it will be until they open again.

Alex said he was "devastated."

“It's like you wake up one morning and you don't have a business anymore. Devastated. That's exactly how you feel. It's a hardship, we have families, we have newborns to feed, and then you have to deal with this,” he said. 

Meanwhile, Atim Oton, owner of , says she doesn't expect to re-open her shop until mid-August, but hopes to curate an art exhibit to go with the opening called "Phoenix Rising" and is looking for artists.

Efforts to secure the remaining wall of 816 Washington are underway, with large steel support beams being bolted inside and out across the length of the building. The investigation into the cause of the fire is ongoing.

Jeremy Kerr, a puppeteer from Prospect Heights, said he is a regular at Coffee Bites and was on his way there when he first saw the fire's destruction. He said that he feels proud of the area's many locally owned businesses, and was pained to see the damage caused by the blaze.

“I was really worried, obviously for the apartments and the other people there,” Kerr said. “I used to go the bodega that was on the corner, just to grab a drink or something."

"A lot of stores and restaurants (on Washington Avenue) you walk in and they smile, recognize you and they know who you are," he added. "You feel personally connected to the businesses."