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Rifle’s Henry Building gets new owners, more businesses

Alex Zorn
  

The Henry Building, which was once a J.C. Penney department store and most recently served as offices for Garfield County employees, soon will be filled with new occupants.
Ryan Hoffman / Citizen Telegram |

The century-old Henry Building in the heart of downtown Rifle, which at one point housed a J.C. Penney department store, will no longer sit vacant.

For the first time since the county purchased the building from Gaylord and Phyllis Henry for $437,000 in 2000, multiple businesses will work out of the historic building on Rifle’s Third Street.

Since 2000 the building housed the Clerk and Recorder’s office, the oil and gas liaison and other county staff members until they moved into the new county administration building in Rifle in May 2016.



Since that time, the commercial space, which sits on prime real estate in Rifle’s central business district, sat vacant with the exception of housing GarCo Sewing Works, a program in partnership with Colorado Mountain College. And the county intended to help people on public assistance develop job skills needed for gainful employment.

That program will continue despite the new ownership.



In October, Garfield County Commissioner Mike Samson expressed interest in selling the county-owned building, and on April 21, the county sold the Henry Building to Michael Picore and Theodore Gallegos for $550,000.

“We were looking for a place to rent and found the Henry Building by accident,” said Bay Equity Owner Mike Picore. “We are always looking for historic buildings, because though it needed work, there’s a lot of uniqueness and character that comes with a building like this that simply cannot be replicated.”

Despite the work it needed, Picore wanted to make it a cornerstone of Rifle again.

“We are willing and eager to bring it back to what it used to be,” he added.

Picore said that despite the shape it was in, he received a great deal of interest from local businesses.

Originally a saddle tack and manufacturing facility, according to F&D International, which does building and facility assessments throughout the state, the 15,000 square foot building is now home to Bay Equity Home Loans, Belessimo Salon and Trendz. By August it will be completely filled.

“Our team is throughout the valley, but we wanted a location in Rifle so that we could have more of a local presence for residents here,” said Deb Dudley, senior loan officer with Bay Equity. “We don’t want to make the Rifle community come out to Glenwood.”


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