Redondo Fun Factory’s empty nest
After nearly 50 years, the Redondo Fun Factory has its final day circled in red: Sept. 2, Labor Day — the unofficial end of summer. The long-lived arcade’s denouement comes, in part, because of the City of Redondo Beach’s current policy against issuing new leases or altering existing agreements on the pier. (See “Lease freeze has tenants in limbo,” this issue, for more.) “They’re saying they don’t want to make any new rental agreements,” Fun Factory owner Steve Shoemaker said in an interview, saying that he sought a month-to-month, or even a day-to-day rental agreement with the City. “We’ve made up our minds; I don’t want it, and I’m tired of doing business with them. They’re terrible business people.” Shoemaker’s declaration comes after his short-lived campaign to keep the Fun Factory around on a short-term lease. The City of Redondo Beach purchased the Fun Factory leasehold from Shoemaker’s Redondo Fisherman’s Cove Company for $9 million in Jan. 2017. It was the last piece in the puzzle for CenterCal Properties’ planned Waterfront redevelopment project. Shoemaker agreed he would leave by 2020, and that he would get a $1 million bonus from CenterCal upon the project’s completion…
Read this story on easyreadernews.com