A recent rush of brand-new businesses opening in downtown Langley coupled with the growing demand for more spaces to lease has city officials wondering if more can be done to motivate the owners of empty buildings to fill their vacancies.

During a city council meeting this week, Councilmember Craig Cyr drew the council’s attention to the building previously known as Mike’s Place on the corner of First Street and Anthes Avenue.

In 2014, new owners purchased the commercial space, according to an article in The South Whidbey Record. The building is the site of a former gas station, which has provided plenty of speculation about whether fuel tanks still exist underground. The Record article from 2014 stated that the tanks do not appear on the state Department of Ecology’s list.

Mike’s Place was the last business to occupy 219 First Street and closed in 2012. Cyr reminisced about trivia nights at the restaurant, which also had an ice cream counter.

“It’s not okay that we have a public works staff that keeps the streets clean and the drains working appropriately and all the public infrastructure that we provide, and to have storefronts that are empty for a decade or more,” he said.

Owners Karen and William Allen, who own a communications company based in Whittier, California, declined to share their plans for the space when asked by a Record reporter this week.

The council’s focus on empty buildings also strayed across the street to the Dog House, which has been under construction since owners Janice and Charlie Kleiner purchased it in 2010. The couple have hit many snags during their renovation process, including a request for access to the back of their building for a proposed garage that was denied by the city council in April 2022.

Langley Planning Director Meredith Penny said in an email to The Record that the contractor for the project is expecting to call for final inspection of the first phase of the project, which focuses on making the building structurally sound, by the end of May.

In his research on what authority the city council can have over empty storefronts, Cyr said he discovered that the city of Everett has an ordinance requiring owners of vacant properties to buy a permit. Everett’s city code also requires that a commercial space vacant for more than 30 days must have a window display of some sort in order to “maintain a vibrant streetscape and avoid adverse impacts on neighborhood character.”

With a storefront vacant for so long, there are also concerns about the building becoming derelict. According to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, vacant properties can quickly fall into disrepair that they no longer comply with local building codes.

Langley Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Inge Morascini, who gave a presentation earlier in the meeting about six new businesses opening, also weighed in on the issue to say she didn’t think there was an excuse for why the Mike’s Place building has been vacant for the past 12 years.

“We’re at a premium for space at the moment,” she said. “People are wanting to come downtown and if we have places, as well as houses, that are not producing economically for us, it’s a detriment to the city.”

Storefronts that are empty or in disrepair, she added, decrease the value of the entire downtown.

During her presentation, she shared that small business owners are “knocking at the door every day looking for space.”

“We can see that the current demand for real estate is really outstripping the available properties for lease, and many other businesses are looking but not finding space in Langley,” she said.

The vacant building on the corner of First Street and Anthes Avenue, formerly known as Mike’s Place, has sat empty for more than a decade. (Photos by David Welton)

During a more festive time, Mike’s Place was dressed up for Christmas. (Photos by David Welton)