Kodama looks to move Go Fish to former Sailor Ed's building
Mystic — Longtime area restaurateur Jon Kodama is considering a plan to move his Go Fish restaurant in Olde Mistick Village to a section of the former Sailor Ed's building on Old Stonington Road.
"If everything works out, that is the plan," he said Wednesday.
"When I first came to the area and opened the Steak Loft in 1973, (Sailor Ed's) was the place. It was the only year-round restaurant in the area," he said. "So I like the history of the place."
The move will be possible if the Stonington Planning and Zoning Commission approves a special use permit being requested by Secchiaroli LLC to knock down the left portion of the existing Sailor Ed's building and construct a one-story, 5,000-square-foot building for retail use in the section of the parking lot closer to Mystic Coastal Flooring. Kodama then would use the remaining right half of the building for the restaurant.
The public hearing on the application was slated to have been held this past Tuesday but now is scheduled for March 15 at 7 p.m. at Pawcatuck Middle School.
In June 2021, the commission approved a plan by George Secchiaroli of Pawcatuck to reopen a 100-seat restaurant and other businesses in the Sailor Ed's building and have two outdoor vendors. That plan has now changed.
Located just east of the Big Y off Route 1, Sailor Ed's had a long run from 1924 into the 1990s, billing itself as "the Shore Dinner House of Distinction." It was popular with locals and tourists. A series of new owners followed before the last tenant, the Tongue and Groove nightclub, shut for good about 15 years ago. It has been vacant since.
Kodama is considered by many to be the dean of the southeastern Connecticut restaurant scene. In addition to Steak Loft and Go Fish in Mystic, he owns the waterfront restaurant Breakwater in Stonington Borough. He also is collaborating with Old Saybrook restaurant owner Colt Taylor on a plan for an outdoor restaurant called Smoke on the Water on the site of Kodama's former Dock & Dine restaurant at Old Saybrook Point. That restaurant was badly damaged by Hurricane Irene in 2011 and then Superstorm Sandy a year later.
Go Fish opened in 1996 but in 2017 its square footage shrunk from 13,200 to 5,817 square feet and seating was reduced from 350 to a little more than 200 as its original lease expired and some of its space was taken by a financial services firm. Go Fish was renovated at that time.
Kodama said that because he wants a freestanding restaurant building and did not want to be located in the same building as a retail shop, the new Sailor Ed's plan meets his needs. In addition, he said he will need 175 seats in the restaurant but added there is ample parking in the large lot to accommodate that. He said there are also issues involving flood plain requirements that need to be addressed. The restaurant borders a salt marsh.
If the commission grants approval, Kodama said he would like to open in the late summer.
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