Owner of Ronzio Pizza addresses rumors of leaving

Despite rumors of Ronzio Pizza leaving the Memorial Union having spread around campus recently, the owner has no plans to close his doors.

“I don’t know where they’re hearing it from actually,” Cosmo Gentile, owner of Ronzio, said. “What is happening is our six-year lease is up in June of this year and we’re in the middle of negotiating a lease with the school right now.”

Gentile stressed that Ronzio has no intention of leaving the Memorial Union and he is operating under the assumption that this is merely a routine lease renegotiation.

But Gentile and the rest of Ronzio’s staff are starting to get worried. The amount of students and faculty who have come up to Gentile and his team and said they’ve heard Ronzio is leaving has been a staggering amount, according to Gentile.

“It’s a good place to eat and we don’t have a lot of choices on campus,” freshman student Roxanne Krawczyk said. “I’d really miss it if it was gone.” Even event coordinators who have used Ronzio’s at the school are under the impression that it is Ronzio’s last year on campus. Gentile said that “it’s not exactly hurting our business, but it sure doesn’t help when people think we’re leaving.”

What is most disconcerting to Gentile and his wife, both of whom own Ronzio, is the delay in renegotiating their lease. Six years ago when they first negotiated a long-term lease, the process was completed by March. But this time around it is proving to be more of a waiting game than anything else.

Gentile is surprised that there is even a question about Ronzio’s lease. “We’ve never had any problems,” he said. “We’ve always paid our bills.”

In fact, Ronzio has always had a positive relationship with the school. They have provided pizza for many different events, including Commencement, the Special Olympics held on campus, sports teams, Habitat for Humanity and many more. Additionally, they hire between 10-15 students every semester to work in the restaurant. Many of these students rely on their job at Ronzio and are worried about the prospect of the restaurant closing.

This process may be more difficult this go-around because Bruce Hamilton, former head of the Memorial Union, has retired and they are going through a new person, according to Gentile. But even with that change, the last correspondence Gentile has had about renegotiating a lease is from Feb. 16. Coupled with the recent rumors they have been confronted with, Ronzio’s does not know what is going to happen for the next year, but they still have hope that everything will sort itself out.

DeAnne Gentile, Cosmo’s wife, said that “it’s not our intention to go anywhere,” adding how it’s “disconcerting” to be faced with all of these rumors as well as the stress of not knowing what’s going to happen next. “It’s not a road we’ve traveled before,” she said.