Senior apartments planned for Sears building

By Phil Major
publisher@wood.cm
Posted 6/9/22

A mother-daughter team who formerly operated restaurants in Mineola plans to convert the Sears Hometown Store building on Loop 564 in Mineola into apartments.

Suzanne Eldridge Gore, who operated …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

Log in

Senior apartments planned for Sears building

Posted

A mother-daughter team who formerly operated restaurants in Mineola plans to convert the Sears Hometown Store building on Loop 564 in Mineola into apartments.

Suzanne Eldridge Gore, who operated Suzie Q’s on the spot now occupied by CVS Pharmacy, and Frances Presson, who operated the Ranchero Country Buffet on N. Pacific until it burned in 2014, plan to convert the 17,000-square-foot building into about 16 apartments targeted for 55 and older.

The first step was to have zoning for the structure changed from commercial to multi-family.

The Mineola Planning and Zoning Commission recommended that change Monday, and it will come before the city council on June 27 for the final OK.

Sears recently announced the closure of 71 hometown stores nationwide, including Mineola’s, and the store is holding a closeout sale.

Eldridge Gore said they hope to be able to begin work in July.

She told the commission that they recognize the cost for converting a retail store in to individual apartments, such as the estimated $118,000 to install a fire sprinkler system.

Presson said she has many friends in the area and they hope to create a community with the apartments.

It will feature an interior hallway.

Fire marshal David Madsen said that normally a proposed zoning change would trigger notices to nearby property owners, but there are none.

He said the property was only recently annexed into the city, and the only adjoining property in the city limits is Loop 564.

He also noted that the area is identified as commercial in the city’s comprehensive plan, but since the property is not contiguous with the commercial zone, it can be changed to multi-family.

The commission also OK’d the replat of two lots at 223 Cheek St. The lots are divided along a north-south line, and the owner, Bruce Turner, requested the lots be replatted on an east-west line so that a home can be built on the other half.