Oct. 25—Village Square Mall will be put up for auction on Monday, Nov. 4. The auction will be at the main entrance to the County Office Building at 10 a.m.

Durga Property Holdings, the current mall owners, owe the city $1.19 million for repair work that needed to be done on the mall due to hazardous conditions. Because Durga Property hasn't paid back that debt, the eight tracts of the mall are going up for auction.

"The city is trying to recoup funds that we've spent on the dangerous and unsafe [conditions]," said City Administrator Steve Miller. "It was a variety of things. A small portion of it was demo-ed. Other larger portions were replacements of the roof."

Miller said the hazards have been a problem for "quite some time."

Steve Letton, Village Square Mall's property manager and lead pastor at Journey Church, hopes to see the mall come back to life through a new owner, if there is one, by bringing in more independent store owners and letting them be the "entrepreneurs they want to be." He hopes the mall will still host events and even entertain new ones.

Effingham Mayor Mike Schutzbach hopes to see some type of improvements inside and outside of the mall. He believes if the mall is re-developed, it will help spur more development in the south side of town, especially since the City of Effingham introduced the tax increment financing (TIF) program. TIF was welcomed into the city to help make businesses' properties more attractive. The TIF program says that the city will pay 25% of construction up to $25,000. Construction can include things like painting, windows, doors and canopies, said Miller.

Carolyn Hollar, 69, owns Hollar's Interior Design in Village Square Mall. She's been in the mall for two-and-a-half years and has been an interior designer for 30 years. She would be "very upset" if the mall were to close. She'd rather not leave, but if she's forced to, she believes that "something will come up."

Hollar explained how there are mall walkers every day, and how they are like another form of security for the mall.

Libby Redfern, 61, and John Redfern, 70, two weekly mall walkers, were not aware of the mall being put up for auction, but they hope to see more events hosted there, like the recent Indoor "Whatever" Garage Sale and the upcoming Midwest Market. Libby was surprised to see Night Terrors of Effingham, a local haunt attraction, not return this year. However, she believes the mall is a great "stepping stone for businesses."