The Daily Campus

Issue date: 4/2/09 Section: News

Media Credit: Caroline Wilde The Mansfield Movieplex closed its doors to patrons in March, leaving several unemployed. The theater was well-known for inexpensive movie tickets.

In March the Mansfield Movieplex, situated inside the Eastbrook mall on the Willimantic-Mansfield line, closed its doors to patrons looking for an inexpensive movie going experience.

"I'm really disappointed they closed," said Luke Hernandez, a 2nd-semester mechanical engineering major. "I used to go there a lot; the tickets were so inexpensive compared to other theaters. I'll miss it."

Cinema North, the corporation who owned the Mansfield Movieplex, reported on its Web site that the location is closed.

Though this cheap movie theater was a favorite among penniless college students from the Univerisity of Connecticut and Eastern Connecticut State University, the implications of its closing reach much further than students looking for cheap entertainment.

With the closing of the theater came more unemployment for the already economically stagnant Willimantic and Windham.

Brandan DeRiso was among those who lost their jobs at the theatre. DeRiso worked as maintenance staff at the Mansfield Movieplex.

"I did pretty much everything, fixed seats, mostly cleaned though."

DeRiso found out abruptly that he had lost his part-time job.

"I got a call on a Wednesday saying not to come in the next day because they were having trouble paying rent and couldn't open for a few days, but she called the next day to say they were in fact not going to be opening again," he said.

DeRiso was assured by his boss not to worry and that the summer business would make up for the slow winter.

DeRiso is not the only one to lose a job in the Willimantic and Windham area recently.

"Unemployment is considerably up in [Willimantic]," said Sal Dipillo, a labor statistic supervisor for Connecticut. According to Dipillo, unemployment in the Willimantic area hit 10 percent in January compared to the state rate of 7.4 percent.

"Connecticut's unemployment rate is now at 7.4 percent which is up quite a bit from February 2008, it's up 2.2 percent. However, we're doing better than a lot of the nation. We're in the middle, about average, for job losses and unemployment," Dipillo said.

For people like DeRiso, however, these numbers are much more than just statistics. DeRiso used to work only 30 hours a week at the theater and 30 hours at his other job working at the No-Freeze seasonal homeless shelter, so both of these were classified at part-time jobs. Since the homeless shelter is seasonal, DeRiso soon won't have any source of income in the next few weeks. Though he will qualify for state unemployment welfare, since he technically only had part-time jobs, DeRiso will go from making more than $400 a week to $100. Though he's searching for a job, the prospects aren't good.

"It's scary not to know where your income is coming from." DeRiso said. "I have 30 days to find a job, or I'm just screwed."

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