Quick Take
A week after a deadly Capitola Village fire damaged their building, the owners of Mijo’s Taqueria and Geisha Japanese Restaurant are still waiting on insurance assessments and remain unable to access their red-tagged spaces. With repairs likely to take up to a year, they’re weighing next steps while receiving an outpouring of community support, including a sold-out fundraiser.
Nine days after a fire leapt from the neighboring building to their restaurant next door, the owners of Mijo’s Taqueria and Geisha Japanese Restaurant & Tea House are still waiting for answers on the extent of the damage.
“It’s just sinking in at this point,” Andrea Guajardo, whose husband, Anthony, founded Mijo’s in 2016, told Lookout on Wednesday. “There’s no update.”
The building, which houses the taqueria, the sushi restaurant, an ice cream parlor and a surfboard storage shop called Soul Portal Surfers, was red-tagged by the city, and the Guajardos can’t go inside to retrieve any of their belongings, such as appliances or tables. Once their insurance company makes a damage assessment – within the next week, they hope – the couple will be able to start cleaning up.
“Everything is still under investigation,” Geisha owner Luis Solorio told Lookout over Instagram. “We were able to get inside the building, but there’s nothing conclusive.”
Just before 10 p.m. on March 9, a fire broke out in a home on Monterey Avenue in Capitola Village. The flames spread across an alley that separated the home from the restaurants, causing smoke and substantial water damage throughout the building.
“From the Mijo’s wall that faced the fire to the further wall of the ice cream shop, there’s water in the building,” said Andrea Guajardo. The resident of the home, 75-year-old Robert Edgren, died in the fire.
Rebuilding the restaurants could take a long time.
“Best-case scenario, we’re looking at a year,” said Guajardo. In the meantime, she and Anthony are trying to figure out if they can pivot, but haven’t come to any decisions yet.
“We’ve received so many calls and text messages,” she said. “Everyone is trying to figure out how they can help and what they can immediately do to get us back up and running. It’s just not that easy, unfortunately.”
Representatives of both Mijo’s and Geisha said they have experienced an outpouring of support over the past week from the community and their customers. On Sunday, Random Acts of Capitola Kindness, a local community group, is hosting a fundraising dinner prepared by local chefs for Mijo’s. The initial 150-person seating sold out within hours, so RACK released another 150 tickets – and quickly sold out a second time.
Solorio said he’s waiting for insurance estimates and investigations to be finalized before he asks for help. “I don’t want to ask for help if it’s not needed,” he said.
The past week has been a difficult time for their family because Mijo’s meant everything to them, Guajardo said. She and Anthony met at Mijo’s nine years ago, and now have two children. Before the fire, they were preparing to open an ice cream parlor called Sandie Scoops next door. This September, Mijo’s would have celebrated a decade in business.
They aim to do everything they can to reopen as soon as possible.
Said Andrea Guajardo: “From our daughters’ school to the business association in Capitola, we’ve felt the desire to come back — and come back strong.”
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