Free Republic

One of Las Vegas’ longest-standing and most historic hotels is shuttering its doors after nearly 67 years to make room for a new Major League Baseball stadium. Tropicana Las Vegas closed on Tuesday, just shy of its 67th. anniversary. Demolition is slated for October to make room for a $1.5 billion Major League Baseball stadium. The hotel, which opened on the iconic Las Vegas strip on April 4, 1957, was nicknamed the “Tiffany of the Strip” for its opulence. When it was built in the late -1950s, the Tropicana cost $15 million to build. It was three stories with 300...

10 states did not fall for the Medicaid expansion trap under Obamacare. The rest are suffering. Private payers (you, one way or another) make up the loss.. Medicaid Expansion Puts Hospitals at Risk.. The Foundation for Government Accountability (FGA) reports Medicaid Expansion Dramatically Increases Hospital Shortfalls emphasis mine. Medicaid expansion ushered in through ObamaCare has led to program enrollment growth well beyond what was promised or projected. While proponents argue that expansion is a silver bullet to keep hospitals financially secure, this is simply not true. Because Medicaid does not pay enough to cover the costs to hospitals to provide...

Banks are growing increasingly confident in the capabilities of online banking, according to Steven Reider, the founder and president of Bancography, an Alabama-based consulting firm that advises banks on branch planning and strategies. That confidence can lead to significant savings since the average freestanding bank branch costs around $2.6 million a year. In just two months, Bank of America's 41 closures might have saved it almost $100 million. .....And now, credit unions are playing a more significant role than ever before - offering very similar services to traditional banks and eating up a share of the market. Unlike banks, their...

Macy’s announced Tuesday it will be closing 150 “underproductive locations” over the next three years as sales dip and the company looks to expand its higher-end luxury brands. The department store chain saw nearly a 2 percent drop in sales during the fourth quarter of last year when compared to its fourth quarter of 2022. In 2023 as a whole, its net sales dropped 5.5 percent and its digital sales dropped 7 percent Macy’s new CEO, Tony Spring, who stepped into the role this month, expressed optimism in a statement accompanying the sales report, which was released Tuesday alongside the...

Chicago has a problem with retailers closing their doors, pulling up stakes, and getting the hell out of the city's most dangerous neighborhoods. Without warning last week, a KFC franchisee "abruptly" shuttered three South Side locations. One outlet, located in Chatham, had been "undergoing renovations for months" when the franchise owner apparently just gave up and boarded up the windows instead. According to the same Fox 32 Chicago report, the Great KFC Vanishing came "less than one month after Cinema Chatham, a local movie theater, shut down." That closure also came without warning. Sixth Ward Alderman William Hall said, "A...

The lights have abruptly shut off at three fast-food locations on Chicago's South Side – leaving residents concerned over lost jobs and the future of those sites. All three shuttered KFC restaurants are owned by the same franchisee. One of them is located in Chatham, where it is not the first business to close in recent weeks. "A closed business is not only a sore eye, but it’s a gateway for violence because when you see abandonment, it looks as if there is no love, no hope in the community," said Ald. William Hall (6th Ward). Ald. Hall says he,...

For the first time ever, the only fast-food chain in America that serves Bible verses with its burgers is closing a store location in Northern California due to “ongoing issues with crime.”In-N-Out Burger will shutter its store located in the Bay Area near Oakland International Airport next month following a wave of robberies, car break-ins, and other crimes, according to The Associated Press.The announced closure of the Oakport Street location marks the first for In-N-Out in its 75-year history."We have made the decision to close our In-N-Out Burger location in Oakland, California, due to ongoing issues with crime,” said Denny...

Local bank branches are closing across San Francisco, as the city’s economic decline continues amid crime, homelessness, and a drug epidemic. The San Francisco Chronicle reported Tuesday: Bank branches are vanishing across the country, and San Francisco is having a record-testing year. Twenty branches shuttered across the city through Oct. 28, according to data from the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency. The closures — from the central Richmond District in the west to Mission Bay in the east, from Fort Mason in the north to Bayview in the south — add up to more than the previous...

A popular grocery chain in New York State is closing several stores and laying off more than 500 employees. It's not a great sign, especially before the holidays, that so many retailers are shuttering locations in New York State. Rite Aid and CVS stores will be closing in New York by the end of this year or next year. Two TJ Maxx and Marshal's stores will be closing. Now this. Shop-Rite Supermarkets Inc., the parent company for Shop-Rite stores has filed with the New York State Department of Labor. The company said in its filing that 567 employees will be...

After 38 years, a popular family-run Vietnamese restaurant in Oakland is closing at the end of the month. Owners of Le Cheval announced on social media that the restaurant’s last day at 1007 Clay St. will be Sept. 30. While “this chapter comes to a close,” they wrote, they will seek a new location elsewhere.Owner Son Tran told KPIX that Le Cheval is closing due to slow sales, which were around 25% of pre-pandemic levels, he said. He also cited criminal activity in the area as a deciding factor. Diners at Le Cheval in 2012. The 38-year-old Oakland restaurant is...

Banks in the United Kingdom are closing more than one thousand private and business accounts every day, according to data obtained by a freedom of information request, which revealed the increasing regularity of the measure against both politically exposed persons (PEPs) and ordinary members of the public. The total number of account closures exceeded 343,000 in 2022 alone, representing an enormous increase in the use of the measure compared to 2016-17, during which around 45,000 accounts were shuttered. Worse yet, banks often fail to explain why they are closing an account. Instead, they merely inform customers that the account has...

PNC Bank is set to shut almost 30 branches, further accelerating America's transition to automated banking. The financial giant follows in the footsteps of JPMorgan which yesterday announced it was closing a quarter of First Republic locations after it took over the failed firm earlier this year. It comes as America faces an access to cash crisis as firms axe branches and ATMs at lightning speed. The number of cash machines fell from 470,000 in 2019 to 451,500 at the end of 2022, according to figures from research body Euromonitor International. The 29 closures are targeted in Maryland and the...

An Old Navy store that has been in San Francisco for three decades is slated to shutter this summer — adding to the growing list of retailers closing down throughout the crime-plagued city. The Market Street location — located just three miles away from its corporate headquarters — will shut down July 1 once its lease expires, according to a company statement. “Old Navy is always evaluating its real estate portfolio to ensure a healthy fleet of stores that can provide the best possible experience for our customers,” said Gap Inc., which owns a number of retailers including Gap, Banana...

Chick-fil-A's oldest restaurant, which opened in an Atlanta mall 56 years ago, is closing. The restaurant, located in the food court of Greenbriar Mall to the southwest of the city, is set to shut for good at 4 p.m. on Saturday, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported. Printed-out signs posted at the location don't give reasons for the closure. Chick-fil-A founder S. Truett Cathy opened the restaurant in 1967 in what was one of the first indoor malls in the Southeast. He'd previously set up a diner in Atlanta called The Dwarf Grill, later renamed The Dwarf House, with his brother Ben....

Toronto’s supposedly ‘anti-capitalist’ cafe, The Anarchist, has announced that it would be permanently shutting down after just over a year in business. In a “nobody saw that coming” moment, a Toronto cafe that describes itself as an “anti-capitalist, anti-colonial cafe, shop and radical community space on stolen land,” announced that it would be shutting down permanently by the end of the month.

Jenny Craig will close its doors after four decades in the weight loss and nutrition business, according to internal communications to employees reviewed by NBC News. In an email sent to employees late Tuesday, the company said it will close “due to its inability to secure additional financing.” Jenny Craig corporate and salaried field employees' last day will be Friday, and hourly center employees’ last day working was Tuesday. The company operated about 500 company-owned and franchised stores in the United States and Canada, according to H.I.G. Capital when it acquired Jenny Craig for an undisclosed amount in April 2019....

Earlier this month I wrote about San Francisco’s flagship Whole Foods supermarket which announced it was closing after just one year because of high theft and security issues for employees who worked there. Today, SFGate reports another store downtown is closing after two decades.Anthropologie, a retailer chain that specializes in women’s clothing and accessories, is closing its location at 880 Market St. on May 13, according to the Anthropologie website. The 880 Market St. location has been a staple of the Union Square retail space, and originally opened there more than two decades ago.Anthropologie didn’t say why it was closing....

Another day another store going out of business in Portland. Last week I wrote about a coffee shop closing a downtown location because of rising crime and problems with violent street people. Today, outdoor retailer REI announced it was closing its only Portland store because of increased crime and theft in the area.In a letter to REI members, the company cited concerns over safety and an increase in crime over the last few years as reasons for the closure.“The safety of our employees, members and customers is always our number one priority. In recent years, Portland has been dealing with...

A report from the United Nations climate change panel doubles down on calls for action to combat planetary warming amid a “rapidly closing window” in a new report released Monday. The latest report from the intergovernmental panel on climate change is a “synthesis” of three recent reports which said that climate change was “unequivocally” caused by humans, that it will increase premature deaths and other poor health outcomes and that a “substantial reduction” in global fossil fuel use is needed to combat the problem. Similar to these other reports, the latest iteration notes that the planet has already warmed about...

The federal government is closing in on the $31.4 trillion borrowing limit, meaning a high-stakes fight over raising the debt ceiling is fast approaching. An estimate from the Peter G. Peterson Foundation places the nation’s debt at $31.39 trillion and counting on Wednesday, just a hair below the limit set more than a year ago. That doesn’t mean the debt ceiling will have to be lifted this week — or even this month. The Treasury Department can generally use what are known as extraordinary measures to put off an actual debt crisis. But it’s clear the fight is edging closer,...