New management company seeks to improve historic Virginia Park shopping center

With its grocery store, dollar store, and Chinese food restaurant, the Virginia Park Shopping Plaza seems pretty typical for a strip mall. Set far back from Rosa Parks Boulevard behind a sea of parking, the shopping center looks like it could be found just about anywhere. Most of the storefronts are occupied and just three remain vacant.

Virginia Park Shopping Plaza isn't your typical strip mall, however. Built in the 1960s, the 72,000-square-foot shopping center was dreamed up by a group of Virginia Park residents who wanted to create positive change in their neighborhood after the civil unrest of 1967. Residents formed a nonprofit, Virginia Park Community Investment Associates, Inc. (VPCIA), which built the shopping center and owns Virginia Park Shopping Plaza to this day.

A new push to re-energize the shopping center is being made as VPCIA has hired Beal Properties to manage the site. Beal manages commercial and residential properties in Detroit, Ypsilanti, and Ann Arbor.

"This is our first shopping center, first grocery store-based situation," says Stewart Beal, president of Beal Properties. "But the key to property management is to be responsive to needs, no matter the property."

Beal took over management duties May 1 and will complete the first round of capital improvements within the first 90 days. Re-striping the parking lot, making signage improvements, and getting the vacant spaces presentable are among the first priorities. Putting pressure on DTE Energy to fix a large hole behind the building is also among Beal's chief concerns.

For the three vacant suites, Beal hopes to find a small Subway-like restaurant franchise, a larger restaurant to fill what used to be a Ponderosa Steakhouse location, and a local or regional pet food shop.

Virginia Park Shopping Plaza is located at 8665 - 8671 Rosa Parks Blvd.

Source: Stewart Beal, president of Beal Properties
Writer: MJ Galbraith

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