‘Ruined my life’: Portland business owners shocked by notice to vacate building

PORTLAND Ore. (KPTV) – Businesses leasing space in a downtown Portland building were told suddenly and without explanation that they will need to move out by the end of November, according to the business owners.

Businesses located in the Governor Building at the corner of Southwest Harvey Milk Street and Southwest Second Avenue say they were told by the building’s owners that they would need to leave their spaces by the end of November.

That includes 2nd Avenue Records, which has been on the corner for 42 years.

In a Facebook post on Tuesday, business owners said, “Nothing is certain, except that our tenancy at this location is quickly and sadly coming to an end.”

2nd Avenue Records asked their customers to redeem gift certificates and pick up consignments in the upcoming week, and asked people to “stay tuned” for future plans.

When FOX 12 spoke with business owners on Wednesday, they said they were in ongoing negotiations with the building owners and did not know why they were being asked to leave.

Some customers said they had been visiting the store for decades, and hoped the immense community support would keep the store open, regardless of location.

“They’re friendly, and there’s just been a relationship built over time,” said Paul Dickow, who said he’d been visiting the store since 1995. “They’ll carry cool local bands and special order stuff. But also I come in here just to discover things.”

He said he was initially nervous they would be forced to shut down completely, but he hopes it won’t be the case.

“There’s a lot of vacant retail Downtown and they have a lot of supporters and there’s a lot of motivated landowners, so I’m hopeful they’ll continue to have a home somewhere either Downtown or somewhere else,” Dickow said.

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A few other small businesses in the building said this situation has changed their lives.

Portland Arts Collective, a nonprofit formed by Aurora Josephson, is a space for artist gatherings and education. The walls are covered in her mother Mary Josephson’s artwork.

She said that in early September, she was told she would have to leave her carefully curated space by the end of the month, which was then extended to the end of November.

“I believed we were negotiating the lease, and then it became ‘we want you out of the building,’” Josephson said.

Josephson opened the space a year ago, after what she said was hundreds of hours of work to transform the previously dingy room.

“The walls have been plastered, the floors have been resurfaced. There has been money, and time has been put in, and I was really hoping to stay longer,” she said. “I would absolutely not have signed a one-year lease knowing I would have to leave in a year after doing all this work? Absolutely ridiculous.”

She said she is unsure if she will be able to get another space like that off the ground.

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Next door, Dan White is the owner of tattoo shop Villainous Art Collective. He said just three months into his three-year lease, he was told to leave.

Which he said could drive him into homelessness.

“This has definitely ruined my life,” White said. “Because of the hardships in my personal life from starting this business, I won’t have a place to live, so I’m pretty much back to square one.”

He said he has also not been given any information about why he is being asked to leave. His business was also broken into recently, and he said things can’t get any worse.

“This was my one chance. I’m a working-class guy. This was my one shot. I don’t get a do-over,” White said. “Just when I thought I was up on my feet again after a very tumultuous year, I get a rug pulled out from underneath me.”

The Governor Building is managed by the Downtown Development Group LLC, which is owned by the Goodman family.

FOX 12 has reached out to the company through multiple mediums to ask them why they are asking businesses to vacate and what they have planned for the building’s future, but has not yet received a response.

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