After 35 years of operation in the downtown core, Nancy Caliciuri will have to close the doors of her Hair Bizzare on Main Street because her landlord won’t heat the building.
“My landlord knows I have no heat and he isn’t doing anything about it,” she said, bundled in a winter coat within her own store. “I have no idea why; either it’s not working, or it’s been turned off because he isn’t paying his bills, I don’t know. I have to work with my coat on and even then my fingers are already frozen.”
Caliciuri said this hasn’t been the first time heating the building has been an issue, with the heat being turned on and off each year, but this time, her issue had gone too far. With no way of contacting him directly, and past attempts being met with silence, she feels like she has no choice but to leave.
“This year it hasn’t ever come back on and he hasn’t been responding to calls at all to turn it back on,” she said. "Everybody else in the building has left. The tenant upstairs left a couple years ago because he had no heat too."
Without the heat, Caliciuri said she’s had to arrive at work an hour early just to start the portable heaters to get the place warm enough to at least serve some of her clients, but as a whole, she’s been losing businesses and work time as a direct result.
“I can do dry haircuts at least,” she said, “but I can’t to somebody’s hair if they want colour, highlights, a perm or other chemical services because then they’d have to sit with their hair wet for an hour and a half or so.”
And after running her business for 35 years, she’s developed strong relationships with her clients, who she said are family to her and it’s been hard for her to try and service clients in an uncomfortable setting, as well as imagine moving her business elsewhere.
“I’ve been down here since ’82 and am kind of a landmark downtown,” she said. “But I have to take care of my people and my responsibility is to make sure they are comfortable. It’s really sad for me, which is why I’m here right now with frozen feet.”
For Caliciuri, this dilemma has put incredible pressure on her plans to eventually move her business to home and has said reaching out to different agencies has provided little help to her.
“After contacting every agency out there I know of, City Hall, DIA, Ministry of Labour, the Health Unit, and a few others, there seems to be nothing for commercial tenants,” she said. “I even talked to a lawyer and he suggested I just leave. It’s not like I can just take my scissors and walk out, I have to put an end to an entire lifetime and spend a bunch of money to move to another location. I’m not able to stay here all day long.”
Dating back to October, Caliciuri has had to cancel appointments and close early, the chilling cold of her workplace keeping her from making a living. However, time is against her as the cold of winter gets worse.
“We’re only in the single digits right now and I’m already freezing,” she said. “I can’t imagine how cold it will get later on.”
Caliciuri said she hopes to open up her services at her home at 1416 McKeown Avenue by December first and be able to provide her clients with a much warmer experience.
