Judge Rules Ocean State Job Lot Can Stay in Falmouth Shopping Center
Back in March Ocean State Job Lot was served an eviction notice just five months after they spent $1.3 million to renovate their space at the Falmouth Shopping Center. New owners Joseph Soley and Jonathan Cohen claimed there was a "technicality in the exchange of documents." Ocean State Job Lot took them to court and a judge has now ruled the popular department store can remain.
According to the Portland Press Herald, Soley and Cohen's development company has a plan to expand the shopping center by adding senior housing, offices, a hotel and restaurants, along with indoor and outdoor recreation spaces. It seems they found a loophole to use to try to prevent Ocean State Job Lot from being a part of it, but Business and Consumer Court Judge Robert Mulhern was having none of it.
He ruled in favor of Ocean State allowing them to stay and ordered the shopping center owners pay their attorney fees.
It doesn't seem like Falmouth wants this anyway. In July, the Falmouth Town Council voted to deny a zoning change that the shopping center owners requested for their project.
Ocean State Job Lot is here to stay and we'll have to wait and see what becomes of the Falmouth Shopping Center in the future.