(Radio Iowa) – Governor Reynolds says she’s reviewing the situations in Cedar Rapids, Davenport and Waterloo where HyVee stores are closing for good next month and will take a look at options that might address the situation. Reynolds was in Cedar Rapids Wednesday for a bill signing ceremony. The governor and Cedar Rapids Mayor Tiffany O’Donnell spoke briefly about the closure of a HyVee in a downtown neighborhood.

“I told the mayor that we would do everything we could to work with them and take a look at, you know, where’s the food bank, where’s the opportunity…maybe we could have some type of a scaled down food mart for them,” Reynolds says. “I haven’t had a chance to sit down with HyVee yet to understand where the movement is, but our number one goal is to make sure that the constituents, the individual residents have access to food.”

The City of Cedar Rapids provided HyVee nearly a million dollars in incentives to build a new store across the street from an older, smaller HyVee. HyVee has said that location, which opened in 2002, has consistently failed to meet financial goals over the past several years. HyVee has made a similar statement about the stores in Davenport and Waterloo that will close. Advocates for residents in the neighborhoods around the three stores warn once those HyVees close, there will be no access to affordable, fresh food in those areas. Reynolds says there may be creative solutions.

“Maybe it’s a bus line that they don’t have in place where they can get on and get to one of the existing grocery stores,” Reynolds says. “…It might be as easy as that until they can figure out maybe a more long term solution.”

In June of 2018, a HyVee in Des Moines was temporarily closed after flash flooding hit the store. HyVee set up a free busing system to give customers in the neighborhood rides to and from another HyVee.