Swift Current Mayor Al Bridal has responded to a social media post claiming the City of Swift Current is impeding a local business from opening its doors.
The post on Facebook, made late Tuesday night by New Beginnings, a non-profit thrift store planning to open at 508 Cheadle Street West, stated they would not be accepting donations "due to the City of Swift Current not allowing us to open our doors."
The post claims that the business has been ready to open since February, which is when the City approached them about building code deficiencies and placed a stop work order on New Beginnings.
Bridal says that they have been working with New Beginnings at the City for over a year and that their decision to "air their dirty laundry" and accuse the City of stopping them from opening is something being taken seriously.
"In some ways, they are 100 per cent correct," said Bridal. "We have stopped them from opening. The reason we stopped them is because they have not followed the rules that they knew about when they bought the building."
Bridal says that the owners were informed of renovations that would need to be completed before they could open to the public, for both employee and customer safety concerns.
"They were told about them, and they chose to ignore them," said Bridal.
According to Bridal, one of the issues that needed to be addressed was proper fire exits. In the event of a fire, all commercial buildings are expected to have accessible fire exits that are up to code. This issue became relevant when New Beginnings moved part of their store into the second floor.
"I was told that the second and third stories are fire hazards," said Bridal. "They're not going to let the public up there, but even for employees they are at risk of the fire hazard because it hasn't been set up in an orderly fashion."
Part of the requirement of their building plan is that merchandise has to be laid out in aisles, which has not happened, Bridal said. They also need to provide a plan for what to do in the event of a fire, while an employee is on either the second or third floors that conforms to Swift Current's building code.
"They needed to supply a plan on how to egress the building in the event of a fire where they could navigate the aisles," said Bridal. "Without having to climb over clothes and furniture."
Another issue is that the third floor only has one exit currently, and is required to have a second. Even if it's only for storage, the safety requirements are the same, the regulations state.
New Beginnings, in the same social media post, also claimed that they have been waiting for four and a half months for a decision on these issues, but that the list of code deficiencies keeps changing and getting added to.
Comments on the post also indicated a belief that the City of Swift Current building inspector was to blame. The individual employed by Swift Current is new in the role, which led the City to hire a professional assessment contractor. CCSASK, the Construction Code Authority of Saskatchewan, is the contractor hired to look over the inspection at 508 Cheadle Street West.
"It's not just one person," said Bridal. "It's a large firm that does inspections all across our province. It wouldn't matter if this building was in Swift Current, Yorkton, or Regina. It would have to adhere to the same rules."
Bridal did sympathize with the owners at New Beginnings. In their social media post, the non-profit claimed to be losing money because they were unable to open their doors.
"I've talked with the owners, and I feel bad for them," said Bridal. "But I was a contractor for 40 years. I would never allow a customer to get as far as they did without proper permits."
According to Bridal, New Beginnings has been working on its own renovations themselves. He went on to say that a contractor would have been liable to fix these issues before proceeding further.
"They were their own contractor, and I feel for them that they can't open their door," said Bridal. "But whether their store is in Swift Current, Prince Albert, Regina, Yorkton, or Estevan, it would not be opened if they went by the same playbook they have used up till now."
Swift Current Online has reached out to New Beginnings for a response on the dispute, and had not heard back before publishing time.