BECKLEY, WV (WOAY) – As everyone now knows Fruits of Labor Uptown closed its doors on Friday, Aug. 23, 2024.
Beckley city attorney and former councilmember Robert Dunlap says discontent and hard feelings abound for many about how that went down.
“Fruits of Labor moved here because they had in writing exchanges with our prior mayor when it was a strong mayor and as such they moved up here, relied on those promises,” Dunlap says. “And city council really wasn’t a part of those negotiations. Then for the next year or two years, we weren’t given a lease to approve to extend the Fruits of Labor.”
The business staying afloat upset many in Beckley because of what they believed to be ‘below market rent’ and thinking Fruits of Labor wasn’t paying its way.
“Not really recognizing the benefit they brought to the community in the way of drug rehab,” said the city attorney. Other facilities do drug rehab but the city doesn’t subsidize (them). So, if they’re a private company people ask and rightfully so, why them? We’re now at the point where none of that matters.”
According to Dunlap, since the new council came on board and the weak mayor took the reigns we lost.
“The Pinecrest Development, we lost 108 Main Street business incubator at the NRGDA and now we’ve lost Fruits of Labor,” the former councilmember said. “So this new council has got to take its power; it’s never had it before. It’s the first time the government’s been structured this way, and it’s time if they really want to make a change to step into that role.”
While many benefited from Fruits of Labor, and its shared space — sister entity Seed Sowers — Dunlap says others had the ‘not in my backyard’ mentality.
“They didn’t necessarily want that uptown, they didn’t want that element, people standing around between classes, said the city attorney. “They didn’t feel like that was the best look.
There’s a lot of different reasons why people were dissatisfied with their existence. But what we have is a huge structure that the city owns that’s been improved and some responsibility for making promises that we didn’t uphold.”
Dunlap says we have to stop getting bogged down in the social media madness and business needs to step up.
“If somebody thinks they can make a restaurant work there and work better then they need to lease the space from the city or offer to buy it, and let’s move on,” the former councilmember said.
This leaves us with another empty storefront uptown and Upland Soul Food the only remaining restaurant still serving there.
*We reached out to Fruits of Labor founder/president Tammy Jordan for comment but have not heard back as of this time.
