LEWISBURG — Charles Bressler has operated Music and More for about 20 years.
The shop in the DeWitt Building, owned by Bucknell University, started out in a small store beneath the CVS.
It moved up to the 400 block of Market Street in 1994.
The retired social worker, who gives music lessons and sells instruments at the shop, said he isn’t sure what the future holds for the store — where he jokes he goes to get out of his wife’s hair.
From what he’s heard, there are major renovations planned for the building.
“I expect I’ll probably have to relocate,” he said. “They told me I’m welcome to stay, but with the work I’m told will happen, I don’t see how I could possibly stay.”
Although university officials say they are in the very early stages of planning, Bressler and his neighbors — Purity Candy and the Edwin D.
Mensch Agency — don’t have to go anywhere.
“Right now, we’re committed to maintaining the retail space in that building,” said Tom Evelyn, the university’s senior director of news and media relations.
The university bought the building about two years ago as part of its Lewisburg Core Community Initiative, or “Gateway Project.”
The school also bought other buildings downtown in hopes of better integrating its students and community.
The recently opened Barnes & Noble at Bucknell University Bookstore — next door to the DeWitt Building — is the most recent development in the initiative.
The university has in mind the creation of a business incubator on the second and third floors of the DeWitt building, tentatively named the Bucknell University Innovation Center, Evelyn said. The school would team up with a state program called the Keystone Innovation Zone, which tries to foster business growth in the technology field.
Bressler said he has spoken to university planners who say the building will need to be brought up to code. That means installation of a handicap- accessible ramp and an elevator.
It is his understanding the back part of his shop will be demolished to make room for that, plus parking.
While he might be able to keep the business open with smaller space, he doubts he’ll be able to continue giving lessons while renovations are going on.
“There’s no way I could maintain a business here during all that,” he said.
Evelyn said the building would have to be brought into Americans with Disabilities Act compliance, but stopped short of confirming what Bressler was told.
“We’re in the very early stages of planning,” Evelyn said. “The key point to be made is the first floor will remain retail space.”
In addition, there is no set time frame for any work to occur, he said.
Bressler, who perched upon the bench of a pipe organ in the corner of his shop, said he has watched the town of Lewisburg change and grow in the past few years. It’s a great town for a business like his — a lot of white-collar workers who want their children to learn a musical instrument.
And he said he doesn’t object to Bucknell buying buildings and sprucing them up.
Still, he said he has some concerns about the bigger picture.
“Maybe not in my lifetime, but I’m worried this will all be one big urban sprawl from Maine to Florida, and back to the Appalachians,” he said.
What about the shor t term? “It’s tough to say what’s going to happen,” he said.
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People walk past the DeWitt Building in the 400 block of Market Street in Lewisburg on Saturday. Robert Inglis/The Daily Item
Discussion
Bucknell plans new project
Business incubator to take 2 floors of DeWitt Building
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