Employees work to keep spirit of Someday alive
By David Taber

Mayor Joseph A. Curatone met with employees of the embattled Someday Café twice last week, and pledged his support for efforts to open an employee owned coffee shop in Davis Square.
  ‚ÄúWe want to do everything we can to keep the spirit of the Someday alive,‚Äù said Meghan Silverberg, Curtatone‚Äôs public information officer.

  Earlier this month Someday Cafe employees learned the shops‚Äô owner, Gus Rancatore, forgot to renew the lease allowing the building‚Äôs landlord, Richard Fraiman, to lease the space to Peter Creyf, proprietor of Mr. Crepe restaurant. 
  Shortly thereafter, five employees began discussing the possibility of buying Rancatore out, renewing the lease, and operating the store as an employee-owned cooperative.  At a public meeting July 16 both Fraiman and Creyf indicated that they might be interested in working with the group if they could find a new space in Davis Square for Creyf to move in to.
  But at a meeting in the caf√© Wednesday July 19, Curtatone informed them that Fraiman was not willing to rent to the group.  ‚ÄúBasically the mayor and {Gewirtz} officially told us that Fraiman wasn‚Äôt going to lease the space to us,‚Äù said Chris Miller, a manager at the Someday and a member of the collective trying to continue the cafe.
   Now the group is looking for a new space and a new name, Miller said.
   Participants in the someday community Google Group, which sprung up shortly after community members learned the coffee shop might close, were quick to start suggesting new names once it became clear that the current caf√© could not be salvaged.  Nine messages under the new name suggestions string appeared July 19, including suggestions such as, ‚ÄúTomorrow Caf√©,‚Äù  ‚ÄúSomewhere Caf√©,‚Äù ‚ÄúSomehow Caf√©‚Äù and ‚ÄúSomeway Caf√©.‚Äù Another poster suggested ‚ÄòJeff‚Äôs‚Äô in honor of Jeff Hale, an original Someday owner who is now deceased. 
  Tanya Hahnel and Danielle Sullivan, two of the employees interested in opening a new Someday Caf√©, met with Curtatone and Jim Kostaras, Director of Strategic Planning and Community Development to begin discussing ways the city could support the now nameless coffee shop.
The mayor promised to help the group find a new location and help them secure loans or grants to start their new business up, said Silverberg.
  ‚ÄúNo specifics were discussed, the conversation is still very much in its infancy stages,‚Äù Silverberg said.
  Hahnel, who works at the Malden Housing Authority as well as the Someday, said that while she is grateful for any support the city might offer, the group is not counting on public funds to cover their start up costs.
“With federal funds all grants and loans are restricted to low income or percentage minority areas, so their hands are tied for most of Davis Square,” she said.
  She said the group is going to be relying on fundraising efforts and funding from private groups that have similar interests.
  ‚ÄúWe are hoping for support from arts councils and groups that support small businesses or employee owned and operated businesses.  The problem is that most of these groups don‚Äôt have large amounts of funds to invest,‚Äù Hahnel said.
  The Brookline based ICA Group, a not-for-profit consulting firm that specializes in strengthening employee-owned cooperatives and community-based projects is advising the Someday group.
Hahnel said that they had already been working on two business plans, one to reflect costs if they managed to keep the space and one in the event that they lost it.
  ‚ÄúWhat we have right now is a good idea of what numbers we need to have for a good business plan,‚Äù she said. They are hoping to rely in part on enthusiastic community support to defray renovation costs, she said.
  ‚ÄúA lot of people have volunteered to help us who have done work in the store, who we have established working relationships with,‚Äù Hahnel said.
  But moving to a new space, with added costs like building new counters, installing plumbing for the espresso machine, installing sinks, an ice machine, and a sound system, make the project more challenging, she said.   
  But the group is dedicated to meeting the challenge. 
Hahnel said the group is committed to creating a new space to fill the void that many perceive the closing of the Someday in mid-August will leave in the community. “We would like to have a coffee shop that continues to function as a cross between private and public space,” she said.
  Hahnel said that if the new Someday Cafe gets off the ground, the group would be interested in working to set up a community based fund for Davis Square to support local businesses and insure that community members can have greater say in the neighborhoods future.
  ‚ÄúThere is no reason a business would not be able to donate ten percent of its profits to a fund to help keep Davis Square affordable. We would love to be able to buy back in that sense,‚Äù she said.