Friday, June 2, 2000 | 11:14 a.m.
Larry Watson looks out the windows of his South Main Street used furniture store and sees plenty of parking spaces and an empty sidewalk.
After 20 years at the location just off Charleston Boulevard, Watson is faced with a dilemma he attributes directly to city revitalization efforts.
By cleaning up certain problems to make downtown more attractive, Watson claims the city is actually creating a potential blight. Enforcement of an old city ordinance began in earnest last June, prohibiting used furniture stores from displaying goods on the sidewalks in front of their property.
"It appears to me that our city is trying to hurt a business," Watson said while sitting at a dinette set inside his Creative Home Furnishing shop. "I've had to lay off two people and four stores near here went out of business."
Although Watson said other shop owners took advantage of the city's lack of enforcement of the ordinance by cluttering the sidewalk with chairs, barstools and desks, he claims his store was never the problem.
"We should be able to work some kind of compromise," Watson said. "I can't get enough business in the door."
The city's zoning code was amended in 1982 with a clause prohibiting displays of merchandise other than potted plants outside a furniture or appliance store.
City officials said that while the code was clear, it was never enforced until residents began complaining to the city and council members last year.
City Councilman Michael McDonald, whose ward used to include the Main Street used furniture stores, asked for the increased enforcement because the sidewalk clutter was beginning to cause safety problems, according to McDonald's assistant, Rick Henry.
"It wasn't just the aesthetics, it was a hazard," Henry said.
Sharon Segerblom, the city's director of Neighborhood Services, said stacked furniture toppled over in the wind and forced pedestrians into the street.
"It was all over the place, into the right of way and blocking wheelchairs," Segerblom said.
Watson denies that his store added to the problem, and insists that he needs to display goods to draw passing motorists into his store.
"I'm just having a lot of trouble," Watson said. "If things don't change, I'm out. I'm gone."
Sales at his store in April were off 46 percent from April 1999, before the city began enforcing the code.
Watson said he thinks he should be allowed to place furniture behind a line roughly 5 feet from his storefront. Any business that violates the space constraints would lose its license under Watson's proposal.
"There's a need for this kind of business," Watson said. "Not everybody can afford new furniture. I don't think I'm asking anything wrong."
But his request for a new ordinance has fallen on deaf ears.
City Councilman Gary Reese, whose ward now includes Main Street, said he doesn't understand why Watson and a few other store owners can't turn profits without displaying goods outside.
"You don't see Walker Furniture with furniture all over," Reese said. "The ordinance passed for a reason.
"I don't have somebody sitting outside of my barber shop with long hair waving (to people)," Reese added.
Watson has been asking council members individually to remedy his problem. He claims McDonald told him to work with the city attorney's office to create some type of amended ordinance, but McDonald never assisted him when Watson sought help.
Now Watson listens to the council talk about cleaning up downtown and turning Main Street into something of an arts district.
"I'm all for that because it would help my business," Watson said. "But if they don't change things they're going to force us out of business before that happens.
"Why would you want a bunch of vacant buildings when you're trying to attract business?"
Segerblom said enforcement of the ordinance is applied equally to the used stores on Main Street and to larger chains like Costco and Lowe's.
"We're not singling anyone out," she said.
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