Minneapolis Salon Owner Says Rioters Burned Her Building to The Ground And Then The City Stuck Her With a $200K Bill

The owner of a Minneapolis salon set on fire during riots over George Floyd’s death in May, said recently that rather than helping her rebuild her business, state and local officials opted to tear down the building and stick her with the bill.

“I haven’t gotten anything, not a penny,” Flora Westbrooks, the owner of Flora’s Hair Designs, told “Fox & Friends” on Thursday after host Peter Doocy asked her how much aid she had received from the government.

Instead, the city of Minneapolis tore down the building and charged Westbrooks for it — at a whopping cost of $200,000.

“[The] bill is going to be over $200,000 just for tearing things down and putting up a fence there, so it’s going to be lots of money that I can’t afford that I don’t have,” she said.

In a statement provided to Fox News regarding the project, city media relations manager Casper Hill said that the building was at risk of collapsing and was torn down to “protect the public.”

Westbrooks found that explanation quite rich as she recalled there was no protection for her building as riots raged on in late May. She said she “didn’t see any police at all patrol [her] area” on the night her business was torched.

“I just feel like I’m alone and I’m sure other business owners feel the same as I do,” Westbrooks added during the interview.

According to a GoFundMe page set to help her rebuild, Westbrooks operated the business for more than four decades before it was burned to the ground.

The page describes the business as “a pillar on Broadway Avenue where men, women and children came to get beautified and had history lessons from elders in the community.

“Flora has exhausted all of her energy and savings in building the community, creating jobs for entrepreneurs and aiding in generational wealth,” it continued.

At the time of publication, more than $150,000 had been raised on the GoFundMe page.

During the interview Thursday. Westbrooks remained steadfast in her plans to rebuild, despite the injury from rioters and then state and local government.

“My plan is to rebuild my business,” she said. “I built that business myself and I just want my business back. That’s all I want, to just get my life back. I want my life back.”