Betty’s serves its last meal

Betty’s serves its last meal

Oxford St icon Betty’s Soup Kitchen served its last meal on Sunday.

After 21 years, owner Ron Ehrlich said the final straw was the City of Sydney’s refusal to renew his lease.

“They’ve asked me to leave because my lease has run out,” Ehrlich said.

The City, which owns the building, claims Ehrlich owes $130,000 in rent.

The Star Observer understands other gay and gay-friendly businesses on Oxford St have signed similar lease agreements, which promised the redevelopment of the building in return for rent increases over the five-year term.

The promised redevelopment — which was to have included a new grocery store and shopfront makeover — never happened.

“For the last five years I’ve had promises of redevelopment, but the work was never done,” Ehrlich said.

Ehrlich said complaints over broken promises and poor planning had fallen on deaf ears, both at council and the office of Sydney MP Clover Moore.

“Clover has shown no interest in resolving this. If I can’t go to my local MP or my mayor, then who can I go to?”

Oxford St businesspeople who wished to remain anonymous said the council had treated Ehrlich unfairly by charging lower rents to businesses surrounding Betty’s and renovating nearby shopfronts, but not his.

Ehrlich said the immediate impact of the council’s decision not to renew the lease would be seen with 10 staff, including Ehrlich, losing their jobs.

A City of Sydney spokeswoman said Betty’s Soup Kitchen was a commercial operation and needed to pay its rent like any other business.

“The city has tried to negotiate with the tenant to recover significant outstanding rents in an attempt to keep it open for business,” she said.

“The tenant has repeatedly rejected the City’s offers. For that reason, the City is not renewing the lease of Betty’s Soup Kitchen.”

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10 responses to “Betty’s serves its last meal”

  1. Loved Betty’s. Sad to see it go.
    We used to be regulars, but lately visited every few months.

  2. You don’t pay your bills, you don’t stay open.

    The owners of Betty’s can’t expect their landlord to keep covering their rent. If that happened in a residential home, they’d be out in months.

    What a joke.

  3. The owners need to pay their bills and take responsibility for their own actions. If a business fails it is because it is not providing a viable service. Another dead beat not paying his rent looking for a scape goat and a hand out. You are the weakest link, good bye.

  4. While its sad to see it go, I have to admit I haven’t been there for many years, probably like countless others.
    I guess if we all truly want iconic businesses to stay open, we need to go there and spend our money.

  5. This is just depressing and really sad! Pathetic really that an icon like Betty’s will be no more.

  6. If Betty’s Soup Kitchen has a real claim for unfair treatment, it can go to the State Government Retail Tenancy Unit, part of the Office of the Small Business Commissioner. Otherwise, the claims sound like passing the blame and wanting ratepayers’ money to prop up a private business. I probably haven’t been to Betty’s since the 1990s — I have nostalgia for it, but prefer other (more modern) places. Seems like most people are like me and this place is no longer viable. The landlord isn’t responsible for the food and decor — both essential to get and keep customers.

  7. The City of Sydney loses yet another iconic establishment. All good things must come to an end I guess, however this establishment was almost worthy of a heritage listing in my opinion. Maybe these greedy landlords will realise the error of their ways when the entire strip has for lease signs all up it. There are few incentives left for anyone to bother opening a small business anywhere in the City of Sydney.