Demolition begins on former Ray’s Food Place

Published 6:47 pm Friday, March 17, 2017

Demolition crews are tearing down the former home of Ray’s Food Place, a grocery store in Bend, that was destroyed in January when its roof collapsed beneath heavy snow and rain.

Inside the collapsed building Wednesday, some sections of the old store survived: a growler station, landscape murals and signs, like the one that read, “Ray’s High Desert Bakery.” Salvaging the spared material is up to the property owner.

Only empty space can be seen when looking up at where the roof used to cover the store.

“It’s weird to see a roof on the ground,” said Clinton Simmons, superintendent of construction services at Compass Commercial, the general contractor on the project.

The demolition began Tuesday at the SW Century Drive location and is expected to last about three weeks, Simmons said.

After demolition, Simmons said, the plan is to clear all of the debris and shore up three exterior walls for a future tenant.

The owner of the building, the Eugene-based property management company G Group LLC, does not yet have plans for the property in the Westside Village shopping center.

The three standing walls are being salvaged because each is considered structurally sound, and could be the basis for a new building, according to Simmons.

Rows of rooftop solar panels that once turned sunlight into electricity are also being salvaged.

“To get it to a safe condition, is what we are looking at,” Simmons said. “Then they can start looking for tenants to occupy.”

No one was inside the vacant grocery store when two-thirds of the roof collapsed Jan. 18. The building has been empty since 2013, when Ray’s Food Place filed bankruptcy and closed 16 stores, including the one in Bend. The 40,570-square-foot building was completed in 2000 for the grocery store.

Bend Fire Department, located across the street, sent nearly 20 firefighters to the scene the morning of the roof collapse.

Bend Fire Department Battalion Chief Dave Howe, who was at the site Wednesday, said rain overnight likely added a tremendous amount of weight to the snow already packed on the roof. He called it a catastrophic collapse.

Howe said fire departments are not inspectors or code enforcers, and that he was on the site to ensure safety during the demolition process.

“We just want to make sure people don’t get hurt,” Howe said.

Three construction crew members worked at the site Wednesday, collecting debris into two dump trucks. The crew worked under wobbling pieces of the broken roof.

Simmons said he tries to limit the number of people on site to help keep them out of harm’s way.

“We are very hesitant on putting bodies out here,” he said. “There is always a game plan. You have to have one on something like this.”

— Reporter: 541-617-7820, 
kspurr@bendbulletin.com