Trouble on 23rd Street - Part 1

Eddie Tadkesaria does not know what to do anymore. Tadkesaria, owner of Church’s Chicken at 10601 E. 23rd Street in Independence, said his business is vandalized every other night. In the past two years, he estimates that he has lost between $60,000 and $80,000 due to vandalism. 

“I have stores in worse areas; on Prospect, Van Brunt, in the ‘hood’ and I don’t have problems like this,” Tadkesaria said. 

Tadkesaria said his problems have included a  gun pointed at one of his employees, broken store windows, break-ins at his store and racially hateful graffiti on the outside walls. Just recently, vandals took his 55-gallon grease drum from behind the store and spread grease around the lot and all over his windows. 

Tadkesaria was just one of several 23rd Street area business owners and residents to meet at Three Trails Library last week to discuss a recent surge of crime.

The meeting of the Independence Business Crime Task Force was organized by Elisa Breitenbach, owner of Little Bits, located just off 23rd Street. She said she personally handed out fliers to every business on 23rd Street, from Missouri 291 in the east to the Independence city limits in the west. Breitenbach said her store has had eggs thrown at it, graffiti drawn on it and trash left in the parking lot. She hoped to create a network of local businesses to watch for crime.

“We have got to have people step up to the plate to watch out, for people not to be afraid,” Breitenbach said. 

Independence Police Officer Rob Romey gave advice to residents and business owners from the area on how to deter crime. Many of the owners, including Tadkesaria and Breitenbach, said they have already instituted many of the “crime prevention through environmental design” tactics he discussed. Tadkesaria thinks it will take more than just prevention to stop the crime. 

All of the crime at Tadkesaria’s store happens during the night, when the store is closed, even though Tadkesaria floodlights the parking lot every night, at a cost of $1,000 each month. 

“What would happen if I turned off those lights?”

He said that he would like to do a $750,000 remodeling of the store, but is not sure if it is such a  good idea. 

“What should I do?,” Tadkesaria said. “Relocate? I don’t want to run away from it. I’m a bit of a fighter. I don’t want to run away just because someone breaks my windows.”

Babir Sultan, owner of Valero Gas Station across from Church’s Chicken, did not attend the meeting. But he said in the last year, there have been three break-ins at his store, and just last month the back of his store was spray-painted and the store’s windows were broken. Sultan estimates $1,400 in damages just from glass replacement and repainting. 

Next door, A&M Cleaners manager Kellie Swenson said they have been victimized by crime more often in the last year than in years prior. The cleaner was broken into this spring and its outside walls were spray-painted a few times.

The H&R Block at 10200 E. 23rd St. has been hit by graffiti more than once and has had most of its windows broken twice in the last two years. Virgil Brockman, husband of the manager, said the store has spent $20,000 to replace broken windows, and recently, metal shutters were installed at a cost of $10,000 to protect the windows. Still, Brockman sees evidence of where someone has unsuccessfully tried to break the only windows still exposed, which were switched to plexiglass after the most recent vandalism. He thinks the plexiglass and shutters are just a short-term solution. 

“They haven’t figured out how to bust them yet,” Brockman said. “We’re just biding our time.”

Tadkesaria said he is afraid the broken windows and graffiti are just the beginning of a growing problem. 

“Pretty soon someone is going to get shot,” Tadkesaria said. “Wait until I get shot and then figure something out. It doesn’t make sense.”

Many of the business owners, as well as City Council Member Jim Page, point toward the 3-year-old skate park in Hill Park as the source of the crime. Hill Park is on 23rd Street, across the street from Church’s Chicken, A&M Cleaners and Valero and adjacent to H&R Block. 

Tadkesaria said he has owned the store for 11 years. He said that crime has become much worse in just the last few years.

“Everything went downhill when they opened the skate park,” Tadkesaria said. 

Page said he wants the park out. 

“There have been a lot more crimes,” Page said. “(The skate park) is going to have to be closed.”

Not everyone agrees with Page’s assessment on the source of the crime or the action that needs to be taken. Many, including those directly affected by the surge in crime, see the park as a positive in the community.