The Bethlehem Co-Op Boondoggle Has BIG NEWS! No Opening Date Set as the Boondoggle Bumbles Along in Its 15th Year of Not Operating

Dec. 4, 2025

— Jeff Ward, Lehigh Valley News Briefs

The Bethlehem Co-Op Boondoggle has pulled yet another potential opening date.

Well, there goes my Christmas shopping. I was hoping to share holiday joy with Boondoggle gift certificates, kale and celery root.

The Bethlehem Co-Operative Boondoggle has had many grand non-openings.

The 250 E. Broad St. “no-op co-op” has been setting and breaking opening dates since at least 2022. This year it’s had a couple, and a general promise of opening by the end of 2025.

Forget about it. Here’s the message the Boondoggle put out today on Facebook:

“We haven’t announced a public opening date yet. We know past projections have shifted (editorial note: nice euphemism, shifted), and out of respect for our community (editorial note: Respect? Are you kidding me?) we’re committed to sharing a date only when we are absolutely confident every partner, contractor, and funder is aligned. We’re in the final coordination stage now (editorial note: how many final stages so far?), and once everything is fully confirmed, we’ll be ready to make a public announcement.”

The last part is nonsense. They make public announcements all the time, then they retract them or just ignore them. They announced fundraising totals that somehow decline over time, recently going from about $623,000 to $418,000.

Some big would-be donors backed out but earlier, the Boondoggle had made it sound as if the money was as good as in. Did that encourage members to make loans and donations?

Don’t trust this organization’s numbers or statements.

They refuse to make their financial statements public, even though the public involuntarily spent more than $3 million on this nonsense, thanks to Lisa Boscola, Susan Wild and Bethlehem City Hall.

And most of all: IT’S NOT OPEN! And right now, there is no prospect of it being open.

The Boondoggle’s statements can’t be trusted. The public needs to see the financial statements of this ridiculous outfit. The taxpayers are the main investors in the Boondoggle and deserve to see where every penny went. Why would the Boondoggle object? Hmmm.

Remember, it all started in 2011 when somebody wanted a pepper. A few years later, the Boondogglers started playing the local, state and federal government for cash and walked away with about $3.1 million.

They claim to have spent more than $4 million on a store that isn’t open, they’re nearly broke and unless some dimwitted multimillionaire steps in, they’re in deep trouble.

But feel free to send more money! Or make a “member-owner” loan!

Even if it were open, people would drop it for Trader Joe’s in a second, if that chain ever opens here.

What you do with your own money is your business, but why would anybody give the Boondoggle a dime?

Let’s now try to imagine how a group that has spent millions of dollars on an empty store, that somehow overlooked the need to have a refrigeration system, that is running out of money, that has changed its mission, is ever going to operate as a going concern?

Bethlehem City Council and Mayor J. William Reynolds should demand the Co-Op come in for a public hearing, disclose all finances and start telling the truth, not spouting off more happy talk.

If you know anybody in city government, ask them to demand that we find out where the public funds went. NOW.

Let’s stop the madness.

By the way, if you need a pepper, I suggest Wegman’s, Azar’s, ShopRite, Giant, farmers’ markets in season, Weis, various grocery delivery services and a lot of other places.