AUGUSTA — The last remaining Rite Aid store and pharmacy in the city is closing.
The Rite Aid at 83 Hospital St., the only Rite Aid in Augusta yet to be converted to a Walgreens, is slated to close Sept. 30, according to a legal notice.
The notice states prescription records from the pharmacy on Hospital Street will be available at the Walgreens pharmacy at 2007 North Belfast Ave., about 1.5 miles away, in Augusta. That location also used to be a Rite Aid but was changed to a Walgreens after Walgreens acquired 2,000 Rite Aid stores in 2017, 750 of which it has announced it would close. A sign at the store also states prescriptions at the pharmacy would be transferred from Rite Aid to Walgreens.
Friday afternoon the store’s parking lot had several cars in it and a handful of shoppers inside. Some of its shelves were sparsely stocked.
A worker at the store confirmed it is closing, but said she could not comment and referred all questions to Walgreens’ corporate spokesperson.
Calls and emails to Walgreens’ corporate public relations department seeking information about the closure were not returned Friday.
The store and pharmacy is within fairly easy walking distance of Glenridge Gardens Apartments, and MaineGeneral Rehabilitation and Long Term Care on Glenridge Drive, the state Bureau of Motor Vehicles on Hospital Street, and the state’s east side office complex as well as Riverview Psychiatric Center.
There are other stores and pharmacies within a mile of the Rite Aid, however, including a Hannaford, CVS and Big Apple, all off Stone Street.
Ward 2 City Councilor Kevin Judkins, whose ward includes the neighborhood around the to-be-closed Rite Aid, said the closure of the store will be an inconvenience to people living and working in the surrounding area.
“For people who live in the apartments nearby, it’s kind of like their corner store, so it will be an inconvenience, though it’s not like they’re going to have to go 15 miles away, there are other services a reasonable distance away for folks who need them,” Judkins said. “We certainly don’t like to see places like that closing down, or seeing jobs lost.”
It’s unclear whether employees of the store will be offered jobs in Walgreens stores elsewhere, including the two located in Augusta, on North Belfast Avenue and just off Memorial Circle.
In August, when Walgreens officials announced the company would close 200 U.S. stores this fall, a spokesman for the company said they anticipated being able to offer the majority of workers at the closed stores jobs in other nearby locations.
The 83 Hospital St. building is valued, by the city for tax purposes, at $1.49 million. The owner is listed as ARA Realty Limited Partnership, out of Wellesley, Massachusetts.
City records indicate the 11,208-square-foot building was constructed in 1997. It sits on a little more than two-acre lot, and has entrances on both Hospital Street and Glenridge Drive.
Judkins said he’s hopeful the building will be reoccupied, and not remain vacant such as the former Hannaford store on Willow Street has for several years, after the new Hannaford between Stone and Cony streets was built in 2009. The owners of that building have a long-term lease with Hannaford for the Willow Street location that remains in place, even though Hannaford no longer occupies the spot.
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