COLUMBIA, S.C. — A Columbia store has been permanently shut down after being deemed a public nuisance, police said on Tuesday.
The department announced that Main's Best, a convenience store located at 2132 Main St. near Elmwood Avenue had been declared a nuisance on Monday through city ordinance and state law.
Police described the business, which received an initial notice that the city intended to declare it a public nuisance back in April, as a drain on their resources.
"We actually met with the ownership to serve them notice that we would potentially declare them a nuisance if they didn't change some of their patterns and practices that we were seeing that we felt like [were] contributing to some lawlessness and criminal activity in and around the property," Columbia Police Chief Skip Holbrook said.
He added that police had hoped to see some turnaround after putting the store on notice about the issues officers were seeing.
The department said in this week's announcement that, since the beginning of 2021, officers have responded to more than 200 calls at the location for crimes ranging from drug possession and distribution, larceny, loitering, urinating and defecating in public, alcohol violations, and litter and trash accumulation.
The Columbia Police Department said it even filed in protest of the business getting its alcohol permit renewed in June of this year in response to the ongoing issues.
The department, as part of the "law enforcement protest," sent a letter to the South Carolina Department of Revenue - Alcohol Licensing Division. The letter suggested that police believed the store had "failed to operate and sell alcohol in a responsible manner" and that, as a result, the location was "adversely affecting the public health and safety" of the community.