Patty's Diner - Not closing anytime soon

A lot depends on which bank it is and why they are demanding this rent increase. If it is a well known bank that a lot of us have deposits in, it could make them look very bad to be closing this little business in the middle of a recession, and banks do not need anything that makes them look bad right now. If it is a bank that mostly lends to business and no one has ever heard of them, that's harder.

I think we would also write letters to the mayor of Skokie, asking what the city is doing to retain small business.

I know nothing about small business, so others can chime in on this, but perhaps the state rep and state senator might be able to access some assistance for keeping small businesses open. Or the Congressperson.

I'm a community organizer and I do this kind of thing professionally; I think we could put together a pretty good effort, depending on what the research about the bank showed. (If they are losing money hand over fist on Patty's current rent, obviously that makes it harder; as mentioned above, if they are a bank that wants our business, that makes it easier.) We could easily generate media, I would think, and that could add pressure to the bank to do the right thing and to the village of Skokie to show that they care about small business.

All of this would depend of course on Patty approving, and people being interested in participating.

I know a lot about the organizing end; I think there are LTHers who know about the small restaurant end of things, and what it might take to keep Patty viable and what if any resources might be available to help a very popular small business.