‘Still without power’: Towne West closes to customers after the lights go out again
Towne West Mall is closed to customers after the power was turned off earlier this week.
The mall was closed to customers Wednesday, and remained closed Thursday morning, after the power was shut off. Evergy has shut off power several times since last summer, saying mall owners have not paid the bill.
“Kohan Retail Investment Group and mall management were contacted by email and phone regarding the past-due balance and pending disconnect,” Evergy spokesperson Gina Penzig said in an email. “On Tuesday physical notices were posted at the mall, and power was disconnected on Wednesday. Power remains off today and will be restored once payment of the past-due balance is received.”
Anchor stores at the mall are still open and can be accessed through their own entrances. Those stores have their own utility bills, unlike tenants inside the mall, and are in fully paid, Penzig said.
A call to the mall office was not answered.
Passageways, which helps homeless veterans and has a location at the mall, put multiple videos on Facebook about the power being turned off again.
Wednesday afternoon, they posted a video of them trying to open the doors to the mall.
“Everything’s locked, no notes on the doors,” Passageways said in the video, “We haven’t had any direct communications from Towne West or Michael Kohan at all.”
New-York based Kohan Retail Investment Group bought the struggling mall in 2019 along with Florida-based 4th Dimension Properties.
Mike Kohan is the managing member of the Kohan group. He did not respond to a text Thursday morning.
Since the power outages started last summer, 4th Dimension Properties no longer lists Towne West as one of its properties. In response to an email asking if they were still owners, 4th Dimension Vice President of Real Estate Larry Brooks wrote: “We have no interest in this mall……please direct any further questions to Kohan!”
Passageways posted on Facebook Thursday a parody picture of people in the dark wearing headlamps.
“We are still without power. Please pray for all the veterans moving into housing without household goods because the mall is closed,” the post says, ending with “#kohanretail #paythebill.”
On Tuesday night, Passageways, which earlier shared a photo of a disconnect notice posted on a door at 3:15 p.m. that day, said that power was going to be turned off at midnight Wednesday. They said they found out about the power being turned off from other businesses in a text thread the stores keep, not from the mall.
“The only way we find out that lights are going to be off is somebody says, ‘hey we just got a disconnect notice delivered to our store and they are putting them on all the doors,” Passageways said.
Passageways said they would like to move, but many places are too expensive for a non-profit.
“We have been looking at places for a very long time and we were crossing our fingers that we may have an opportunity that was presented to us,” Passageways said. “Keep us in your prayers that, if this is the place we are meant to be, everything will line up and fall in place.”
