JACKSONVILLE, Fla — Hooters, one of the Jacksonville Landing’s original tenants, has served its last beer, its last basket of chicken wings.
(Source: Times-Union)
On Monday, a barren bar, torn up flooring and exposed electrical outlet boxes were all that remained of the restaurant mainstay that outlasted all others during the Landing’s 32 years. Even the restaurant’s iconic, orange neon-trimmed, owl-themed sign was gone.
The closing comes just weeks after the city of Jacksonville bought out its lease for $303,333.31 at the beginning of May. (Three other area Hooters locations remain open — two on the Southside and one in Orange Park.)
That leaves BBVA Compass Bank as the riverfront mall’s lone occupant.
The Alabama-based bank is scheduled to vacate by Oct. 28 after accepting a $450,000 city buyout of its remaining lease.
The bank has been paying $82,944 annual rent, which would have gone up to $86,400 beginning Feb. 1, 2021, according to its lease agreement.
Without the buyout, the bank’s lease with Jacksonville Landing Investments would expire Jan. 31, 2021. It included a renewal provision option that could have extended the lease until Jan. 31, 2024, the agreement showed.
Jacksonville City Council voted in March to pay $15 million to Jacksonville Landing Investments — a subsidiary of Sleiman Enterprises — to buy out the company’s long-term lease for occupying the city-owned land on the downtown riverfront.
That payment settled a legal battle between the city and Sleiman Enterprises over who was at fault for the mall’s years-long decline into widespread vacancies and sparse customers.
City Council also authorized $1.5 million to handle terminating sub-leases for businesses at the Landing, plus $1.5 million for demolishing the mall and getting the site ready for redevelopment.
The city spent about $871,333 of that buyout money before the agreement with BBVA Compass Bank, records showed.
Seven contractors recently submitted to the city demolition bids to tear down the facility on the banks of the St. Johns River. Bids ranged from $978,200 to $2.77 million.