A staple of the Rideau Street corridor, Steve’s Music Store, is packing up and moving out after 42 years in business.
The store will not be closing, its manager says, but rather moving to a new location that is yet unannounced.
Speaking on Newstalk 580 CFRA’s Ottawa Now with Kristy Cameron Dan Sauvé says it was a difficult decision to leave what has been the store’s home for so long.
“We’ve been here for 42 years, and Steve’s family has roots on Rideau Street going back close to a century,” he said. “Rideau’s gone through a lot of things and challenges over the last decade and a half and at one point we just went, ‘It’s not feasible for us to stay here,’ so we started just looking at other options.”
He says several factors led to management deciding it was time to find a new location.
“We’re in a particular spot because we got a little bit sandwiched between a safe consumption site and a methadone clinic, which, in and of itself, is not a problem, but a lot of the clientele that visit either one of those centres, they get preyed upon basically by criminal elements in the city, and that’s where it became a problem for us,” he said. “Either through drug dealers or thieves, that kind of stuff, it became really kind of untenable to manage that, from a staffing perspective. Everybody was stressed out at work because of it.”
Sauvé said the crime in the area led to the store locking its doors and requiring patrons to buzz in to shop, a recommendation from Ottawa police.
“We were being targeted last year by thieves. It wasn’t so much violence as it was people not even trying to hide the fact that they’re coming in to steal,” he said. “Just grabbing some of our guitars off the hooks and trying to walk out with them.”
The issue of crime in Lowertown and the ByWard Market area has been top-of-mind for Ottawa police, and is responsible for its “CORE” strategy, which focuses on a number of “hot spots” for criminal activity, including the Rideau and King Edward area, where Steve’s is located.
The toxic drug crisis, too, has been an ongoing issue in the city. Ottawa Public Health (OPH) says there were 245 suspected overdose deaths in the city as of the week of November 11, and Ottawa is expected to surpass the 291 suspected overdose deaths recorded in the city in 2023. There were 194 confirmed opioid-related deaths in Ottawa in 2023, according to OPH data.
Recent statistics provided by police suggest that there has been an overall decrease in crime in the area since the strategy began, but some areas have seen recent spikes.
“The situation has improved somewhat in the last few months,” said Sauvé, “but at the same time, I think for us, the decade and a half of one thing after another just kind of went, ‘Okay, you know what? We’re due for a change. Let’s look at other options than on Rideau Street.'”
While Sauvé would not say where the store is moving, he hinted that it would still be within the downtown core.
“What I can tell you is that we will always be a downtown store,” he said. “We found a place that’s going to enable us to thrive way more than we are on Rideau.”
Sauvé expects a “seamless transition” from Rideau Street to the new location in the winter of 2025.