After more than a decade in business, The Water Store on Riverside Drive was shut down May 13 by the city of Española.
Owner Dyna Padilla had only a minute’s notice before Planning and Zoning Department employees told her she couldn’t operate her business until numerous code violations were fixed.
“All of a sudden, just at once, I was selling water—and then I wasn’t selling water,” Padilla said.
The violations came as a shock to Padilla, who said her landlord, Gilbert Sanchez, told her all the building’s inspections were up to date.
Sanchez said he never told Padilla that, but he did assume no further inspections were necessary for the property, he said, because it had been inspected by the state in 2003.
Padilla had rented the street-front building at 407 N. Riverside Drive for 13 years. She had a 15-year lease, but in January she had to tell Sanchez that she wasn’t going to make rent and needed to downsize.
In addition to the main building, out of which she sold water and ran an ice cream bar and a thrift shop, Padilla was renting a much smaller building behind her business that she used for storage.
Padilla suggested to Sanchez that she move into that building.
Sanchez agreed but required Padilla to invest in some upgrades to the building, which included installing a gas meter, upgrading the electricity, connecting the water and fixing the plumbing.
Sanchez said Padilla hasn’t paid rent since January.
Padilla said that they agreed the money she’d have to spend fixing up the building was in exchange for not having to pay rent. All together, Padilla said she spent about $5,000 before she could move in.
Sanchez said the arrangement further unraveled when city Planning and Zoning employees drove by his main North Riverside building and stopped to ask about work going on around the outside of the building.
“That is what brought it on, right there,” Sanchez said as he pointed to a repaired patch of plaster on the side of his building.
“I was trying to clean up the building by doing cosmetic work.”
Once city employees were on the property, they found that Padilla had moved her business to the back building, which they said was not properly permitted or inspected.
City Planning Technician Larry Valdez said the business had to be closed because even though Sanchez had acquired a permit for a handicap-accessible ramp at the smaller building, he should have also applied for a zoning permit and a permit from the Santa Fe Construction Industries Division for the electrical work and arranged for city inspections.
“What’s important is that we maintain the integrity of what we’re trying to do here and maintain the safety of the customers going into that building,” Valdez said.
The cease-and-desist order that halted Padilla’s business was issued on the advice of interim City Manager Joe Duran, who is also the city’s building inspector, Valdez said.
“I have to tell my customers that they can’t come in and get water,” Padilla said at her store after telling a customer she was temporarily closed.
“I’m chasing my customers away.”
After a week of the store being closed, Duran and Valdez revisited the property for a full inspection.
Duran said Padilla can reopen her business after Sanchez installs lighted exit signs, emergency lighting and smoke alarms and patches holes in the drywall.
Padilla said she hopes that will be done this week.
Sanchez said he’d do the best he could.
There’s a long list of other repairs and adjustments that need to be made to the building.
Duran said Sanchez has 30 days to comply with those.
During the inspection, Padilla again had to tell a customer that she’s still closed.
“Give me another week,” she said. “I will be open again.”
But it might not be that simple.
New Mexico Environment Department spokesman Jim Winchester said this week that the Department has its own concerns with Padilla’s business.
“We have done a site visit and we’re evaluating the situation,” Winchester said.
“At this point, it’s an open investigation.”
Winchester declined to be more specific.
Padilla seemed less concerned about that. The Department inspects her business every year, she said.