HAYWARD — High Scores Arcade, a spot that specializes in classic arcade games with locations in Alameda and Hayward, may become another coronavirus fatality.
High Scores temporarily closed March 15 as shelter-in-place orders were put in place across Alameda County.
Since then, owners husband and wife Shawn and Meg Livernoche have relied on savings, help from friends and family, and a GoFundMe page that as of Wednesday generated $23,947. Their goal is to raise $40,000.
The couple has moved out of their Alameda apartment — where they stored some of the approximately 150 classic arcade games in their collection — and are now residing in Live Oak in Sutter County as a way to trim expenses.
All that effort, Meg Livernoche said, might not be enough. The prolonged shutdown means no relief is in sight.
“There’s very little left that we can do at this point,” she said, noting that their Hayward location looks certain to close.
The couple sounded the alarm in June, just months into the lockdown, when financially things began looking dire.
It costs about $10,000 each month to maintain the two East Bay places. The couple’s expenses include a storage facility where some games are kept that need repairs.
For some customers of a certain age, the spots can feel like a throwback to their teenage years, as game lights flash, scores ping and chirp, and rock music plays.
Their inventory includes Pac-Man, Donkey Kong and Mario Bros. Other games include Magnum Force, Millipede and Popeye, as well as Atari Star Wars.
Charlotte’s Ice Cream and Cafe, which shared a wall with High Scores at 1051 B St. in Hayward, closed in September, prompting the landlord to think about the property’s future. The landlord’s plans do not include an arcade, the couple said.
“It’s beyond angering that we’re potentially weeks away from reopening, only to have our knees kicked in this close to that,” Shawn Livernoche said in an email.
The couple said they would have ended their month-to-month lease long ago if they had known they would have to go regardless of the pandemic.
Roughly one out of every 100 businesses in the San Francisco metropolitan area, which includes Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo and Marin counties, has permanently closed since March 1, according to a study that Yelp released in September, citing data based on firms reviewed on its platform.
That’s about 2,900 businesses, many of them restaurants. Another 3,300, such as High Scores, are temporarily shuttered with owners jittery about their future.
Kim Huggett, president of the Hayward Chamber of Commerce, said it’s hard to know how many people may be furloughed or laid off because of the pandemic. Three food businesses have recently opened in the city, a promising sign, he said during an interview.
But Huggett also pointed to data released by the Alameda County Workforce Development Board, an employer-led group that works on providing jobs and employee training programs.
It showed about 5,600 people have been furloughed or laid-off as of Oct. 23 in Alameda County’s western unincorporated area.
That includes Ashland, Castro Valley, Cherryland, Fairview and San Lorenzo.
“Whatever way you look at it, that’s a crisis,” Huggett said.
Businesses hit include Hayward’s Olive Garden restaurant, which the report said in March was undergoing a temporary closure that would affect 159 workers, and Ross Stores in San Leandro, which announced it would temporarily close in April, with 109 employees losing jobs.
Just how many businesses have closed because of COVID-19 in the city of Alameda, where High Scores has a storefront at 1414 Park St., was not immediately available, according to Sarah Henry, a city spokeswoman.
High Scores Arcade opened in Alameda in 2013. The Hayward location opened three years later.
What has been frustrating, Meg Livernoche said, is that the couple has gotten mixed signals from local officials regarding when they might reopen.
On Oct. 26, Hayward told them they could, but must keep it at 25% capacity.
The next day Alameda said no.
Amanda Gehrke, an economic development analyst with the city of Alameda, emailed Meg Livernoche, saying she had met with the Alameda County Health Services Agency, and that it said arcades could only open at the “yellow tier,” or the minimal level state officials have set for where the virus can be spread.
That meant High Scores will remain closed, at least for now.
“We asked for more information behind this, and were told that it was because it is harder to physically distance in an arcade, that arcades are high touch environments and there would be increased likelihood of groups intermingling,” Gehrke told Livernoche in the email.
Gehrke added: “I realize this is difficult news, but I wanted to let you know as soon as possible.”
The cost of moving more than 100 games and signs, obtaining permits for another space, creating marketing materials and signing a new lease somewhere else, might be financially and emotionally too much to overcome, Shawn Livernoche said.
Meanwhile, the family hopes the economy will turn around, people will get back to work, and they will stay in business.
“We just want to keep going,” Meg Livernoche said. “That’s all we want.”
https://www.eastbaytimes.com/future-of-east-bay-video-game-arcade-remains-dire
2020-11-12 14:33:00Z
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