Legal battle threatening major project at Dayton Arcade
The completion of the rebuilding of the Downtown Dayton Arcade is in jeopardy as a huge legal battle threatens to derail the return of what is often called Dayton’s “most iconic building.”
Developers Cross Street Partners and their partners, SP Rotunda, are being sued by RLR Investments, the owners of the Fifth Third Tower.
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In court documents, RLR is upset their tenants can no longer get from the Fifth Third parking garage to the tower by going through the Arcade. At one point, they even shut down construction work for two and a half months.
As we showed you on News Center 7 at 5:00, one of the people leading the last stage of the work for Cross Street Partners called the situation “mindboggling.”
To complete the work, developers had to close down a dark and damp walkway used by workers for companies located in the Fifth Third Tower.
“Because the Arcade was closed for so many years, they took liberties and put in a tunnel,” David Williams, manager of the Dayton Arcade preservation project, said.
When construction closed that tunnel last year, RLR’s lawyers went to court in an effort to “protect its property interests under an easement, to protect the interests of its tenants who benefit from and rely on the easement on a daily basis to travel between the Parking Garage and the Fifth Third Center, to prevent CSP from engaging in further acts of trespass on RLR’ s property, and to recover damages for (Cross Street Partners’) trespass on said property in violation of RLR’s property rights,” according to the lawsuit.
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RLR did obtain a temporary injunction that stopped work for two and a half months, but the courts eventually ruled that the Arcade’s developers had the right to close down access during construction. RLR appealed that decision but a Court of Appeals agreed, so now RLR has filed another appeal with the Ohio Supreme Court.
News Center 7′s Mike Campbell went to the Fifth Third Tower looking to speak with representatives from RLR. He was told no one was available in Dayton to speak with him.
Lawyers representing the Arcade developers said an alternative pathway has been in place between the garage and the tower since mid-2023, but the tower’s owner claimed it was not an acceptable alternative to them.
Arcade lawyers have not yet filed their response to the complaint to the Ohio Supreme Court and that court has not yet agreed to hear the case.
As we showed you on News Center 7 at 6:00, the legal battle has also threatened to upend the owner of a small grocery store downtown.
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Joe Abboud is a co-owner of the Stop-and-Save situated between the Fifth Third parking garage and the Arcade and Fifth Third Center. He said he also had problems last year when the legal trouble began and at one point they had their access revoked and their doors boarded up.
“They said if you have a problem, just talk to us but you do not have access and you cannot get in there,” Abboud said.
Abboud shared a video of a man who told him he was an RLR representative. He made sure Abboud didn’t try to go through the doors that give him access to his offices on the upper floors of the tower, and more importantly, the roof where his compressors and air conditioning units are.
He said the representative threatened to arrest him.
Abboud said he believes RLR was upset that Arcade developers were able to close down the walkway and force those who work in the tower to walk outside past his store.
RLR lawyers wrote in court papers that “Vagrants linger in this area of the city in significant quantity, perhaps because the Stop-and-Save store that is immediately next to the Fifth Third Center is one of a few downtown stores that sell alcohol.”
Abboud was offended by that description of people in the area, as many of them are his customers. Now he’s simply happy to still be open, with his roof access restored.