TOLEDO, Ohio —
After thirteen months of patience and persistence, a Point Place business will be getting back to work.
Gary's Automotive received damage after an EF-2 tornado touched down in the area last June.
"After the tornado, within a few weeks, we found out we were underinsured, by a lot," Gary's Automotive's owner David Thomas said. "Should've been about one million dollars and it was like $600,000."
Thomas began to work on finding a way to rebuild the shop while staying within his budget, but to do that he would have to use materials that are not approved by the zoning department.
"It was a cosmetic issue of material of the building wasn't on the approved zoning department's list of material," Thomas said. "Although, it's existing material that was on my building. So, it just was a process."
City councilperson Theresa Morris said the list of approved materials is fluid.
"If you may have built with it before, they may have changed it so now you can't build with it," Morris said.
Morris also said Thomas had gone to the planning commission and the board of zoning appeals, but both requests were denied.
"The last kind of cry, cry for help, was coming to council to our zoning and planning commission," Morris said.
Morris and county commissioner Lisa Sobecki helped Thomas to try and get the materials approved.
Morris said close to 70 people called city council and others reached out to her personally saying they would want the building plans to be approved.
Thomas said he had four people: John Martinelli, Jim Alexander, Marilynn Powell and Leo Brittson, join him down at city council to make his case.
There was also a hearing, where Sobecki said she spoke about the business that Thomas does and why the building plans should be approved.
City council approved the plans at Wednesday's meeting. Thomas said he felt like a kid in a candy store when he found out that city council had approved the plans.
"I slept for the first time in 13 months," Thomas said.
Thomas said he posted on Facebook and heard from hundreds of people how excited they were for the business. People stopped by the automotive shop to say hello, as well.
Sobecki said the reason she wanted to see city council approve these plans is because it's a good business - a business where Sobecki said she takes her cars.
"He was paying his employees," Sobecki said. "They weren't even working. He was paying his employees. Who does that in this day and time? Dave did."
The fence was put around the building on Thursday so construction could begin. Thomas said the building should be demolished in the next few weeks, and the goal is to have the shop finished by Oct. 1.
Sobecki and Morris said this is just one example of why people should pay attention to their insurance policies. Thomas is just one of many other people who are still recovering and doing repairs after the tornado.
"We love Point Place," Thomas said. "The people in Point Place. We love all our customers, all over Toledo, and they're just excited like we are to get back to business."
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