Most of the Murray Hill neighborhood on Jacksonville’s westside has heard that Perfect Rack Billiards, 1186 Edgewood Ave. S will be forced to stop serving food tomorrow, after Sleiman Enterprises put up a fence blocking access to their dumpster, to their grease holding tank, and any access to the rear area of their building, effectively killing the restaurant.
Cory Goff, who runs the nearly 12-year-old business with his parents, said “Nothing can get back here,” “We have oil that needs to get emptied … our dumpster can no longer get picked up … the kitchen produces a ton of waste.”
Goff said the kitchen produces over half of Perfect Rack’s sales. As a direct result of Sleiman Enterprises’s fence 4 employees plus Goff’s mother have been laid off with more likely to follow.
The family plans to keep the bar open, for now, but they fear without the food revenue that may not be enough to keep the business afloat.
One big question is why did Sleiman Enterprises put the fence up to begin with?
There was already a fence in place, one with a lock that all of the business owners affected by the fence, as well as the solid waste disposal companies that needed to empty business dumpsters, and grease holding tanks, had a key to, and access through.
There was no legitimate need for a second fence. There was only one reason for a second fence, especially a second fence with no key or access for anyone other than Sleiman Enterprises, and that was to blockade the other Murray Hill businesses, to remove rear access to their buildings, and force their customers to enter on Edgewood avenue.
But why would Sleiman Enterprises do that?
Our first thought was that Sleiman Enterprises sought to benefit their associates, Wok N Roll and The Stout Snug, both tenants of Sleiman Enterprises.
And yes, with the loss of Perfect Rack both of Sleiman Enterprises associates would benefit via Perfect Rack’s customers having to eat elsewhere.
However, while working on another story we met a former Sleiman Enterprises employee, one with a lot to say about Sleiman Enterprises and Murray Hill.
It seems Sleiman Enterprises has been trying to increase its foothold in the Murray Hill neighborhood for sometime. Their former employee, who wishes to remain anonymous, because “the Sleimans are very spiteful and vindictive”, stated that in particular, Sleiman Enterprises was interested in the building owned by Perfect Rack Billiards.
Lightbulb moment! Perfect Rack has already lost more than half their sales as a direct result of Sleiman Enterprises’s fence. If they are unable to keep their business afloat they will have to sell the building.
The problem with that is no one would want to buy it without rear access, except someone with control over that fence. Enter Sleiman Enterprises. I’m sure they will be willing to buy the building, at a drastically reduced rate, due to it not having any rear access.
At this point the only thing keeping that from happening is if a lot of Murray Hillians start raising a lot of hell.
If you unfamiliar with Sleiman Enterprises, they are the same organization that ran the Jacksonville Landing, until it was scheduled for demolition.