By Robert Tomlinson
News Director
WHITE PIGEON — The days of the Tasty Nut Shop building standing on the corner of Kalamazoo Street and Chicago Road in White Pigeon are now numbered.
On Thursday, Doug Kuhlman, the zoning administrator and code compliance officer for the Village of White Pigeon, announced in a statement that the village has been awarded a $578,556 grant from the Michigan State Land Bank Authority to be used toward the demolition of the Civil War-era building.
The grant comes nearly eight months since the White Pigeon Construction Board of Appeals in a June 2023 meeting upheld an order from the village ordering the demolition of the Tasty Nut Shop building, and comes more than two years after the saga regarding the building’s fate began with an inspection in November 2021.
According to Kuhlman, the grant was done in coordination with the village and Union Hall Block Building Inc. (UHBBI), the nonprofit that had been seeking to restore the building, which has been blocked off from foot traffic on the sidewalks around it since the beginning of 2022 due to the threat of falling bricks and possible collapse.
“The Village and the Union Hall Block Building Inc. will be working closely with the State of Michigan Land Bank to comply with the regulations set forth with the grant program in efforts to remove this hazardous building,” Kuhlman wrote in his statement.
In an interview Thursday, Kuhlman said the village and UHBBI applied for the grant back in early December. He said the village is working on getting a quick claim deed to take ownership of the property, a necessary step before demolition can take place using the grant funds, and which he said negates an order from the Construction Board of Appeals back in July giving UHBBI until March of this year to complete the demo.
There isn’t a timeline for the demolition set in stone, but an anticipated timeline submitted to the state in their application for grant funds show asbestos and lead paint abatement taking place in July with demolition beginning in September 2024 that would take a month to complete.
Current estimates peg the cost of the demolition and other subsequent services, such as asbestos abatement and backfilling, at the $578,556 amount the village received, meaning the grant would cover the budget detail sent to the state in their grant application.
“We all recognize it’s an iconic building in the village. I don’t think there’s anybody that is proud to say we’re demolishing it, but it’s not whether we want to or not, it’s a necessity,” Kuhlman said.
In his statement, Kuhlman included four photos that were a pair of before-and-after shots of two areas of one of the building’s upper floors, taken in November 2021 and Feb. 13, 2024. The pictures show continuing degradation of the brick and the ceilings in the over two years since both pictures were taken, with the most recent pictures showing daylight coming through gaps in what appear to be collapsing bricks near one of the windows in the southwest corner.
Currently there is a structural mesh brace that was put up by UHBBI in the initial stages of its quest to restore the building, but it apparently has not stopped some brick from falling off in recent days.
“You can see the dramatic deterioration of that building in that time frame,” Kuhlman said. “If you look at the netting that they put up on the outside, it’s got a pocket now where it’s catching the brick fragments coming off the building. Then if you look down at the sidewalk, there’s brick fragments laying all over the sidewalk as well.”
The Commercial-News reached out to UHBBI for comment for this article, but did not hear back before this story was published.
Overall, Kuhlman reiterated that it was an unfortunate situation to see the building have to come down.
“There’s nobody that wants to see it torn down,” Kuhlman said, “but it’s not a want anymore, it’s a need.”
The Tasty Nut Shop building has been in dire straits since an inspection of the building was done in November 2021, which recommended the building be demolished due to a plethora of structural issues, including falling pieces of brick from the building’s much-maligned southwest corner and continued sinking of the southwest corner’s foundation.
The issue of the citations given to the building, as well as the order to demolish, led to hearings in St. Joseph County 3B District Court, which in turn led to the formation of the village’s Construction Board of Appeals to have the building owners challenge the demolition and get a timeline to make repairs on the building. The board gave UHBBI three months to stabilize the building, as well as six months to demonstrate the “financial ability” to complete the structural renovation.
UHBBI received the building during the District Court proceedings in May 2022 via quick claim deed from former owners Marjorie Hamminga, who passed away at the age of 87 in July 2022, and Linda Hochstetler. The nonprofit attempted to raise the estimated $2 million to $3 million in funds to restore the building, however in mid-June 2023 the group determined the building was “no longer a viable restoration project” in a letter to the Construction Board of Appeals and would be “focusing our efforts on the safe and effective demolition of the building.” Up to that point, the group had only been able to accomplish getting the mesh brace on the southwest corner.
The Tasty Nut Shop had been in business for over 100 years at their location in White Pigeon, with Hamminga having been in charge since 1986. She had continued to operate the business through the early part of 2022 despite the condemnation of the building.
Robert Tomlinson can be reached at 279-7488 or robert@acnccrtest.c1.biz.