Baltimore Businesses Moving Forward After Last Week's Unrest
BALTIMORE (WJZ) -- Rebuilding after the riots. That's what a lot of locally-owned businesses or doing or debating after last week's riots in Baltimore.
Marcus Washington spoke with a local business owner about the plans of moving forward.
For a small, locally-owned business, rebuilding is not easy---but with the help of the community, it's starting to look possible.
Harvey Levy and his family watched from home as looters stole more than a million dollars in merchandise from the family's Sport Mart store during the night of riots in Baltimore.
One week to the day, the cleanup continues.
"If we cleaned it today, we couldn't open because we don't have any merchandise to display," he said.
Right now, the Levy family says there is no guarantee they will---or can---rebuild the business.
"We're not 100% aware of what the insurance is going to cover or what they're not going to cover," Levy said.
Then there is the feeling of being violated.
"Knowing that some of the people that will come in and shop were part of the looters," Levy said. "How much merchandise do we want to store now and how safe is our building?"
The family says they saw faces they know from the community on surveillance video as people destroyed the store, but there are people in the community that say they want to be the faces that help rebuild.
"Because if this place leaves, there are other stores but not many in this neighborhood, not many that has prices this store has," said Gale Alston.
"It's enough to make you cry. It's great but it's terrible it has to be done," Levy said.
Sports Mart is not alone. There were a number of businesses damaged during riots, including a CVS at Pennsylvania and North.
CVS recently released a statement saying, "We have a long history of serving inner city communities and are 100% committed to serving our patients and customers in Baltimore. We are working diligently to formulate our rebuilding plans."
Governor Larry Hogan says 200 businesses were affected by the riots and the state will do everything it can to help.