FORT PITT BUILDING, PICTURED
A popular Orlando vegan restaurant made an emotional appeal for support on Instagram this week, telling followers it was closing its Old Cheney Highway location immediately after what it described as a break-in and a growing sense that the space was no longer safe. The post, from Karelyn’s Vegan (Instagram), resulted in hundreds of comments echoing support and sympathy, but then the owner of the bakery next door went live with comments of her own.
Celine Beltgens, owner of Valhalla Bakery (Instagram), which shares the Fort Pitt building Karelyn’s operates out of at 5565 Old Cheney Highway [GMap], posted a lengthy video response disputing virtually every element of Karelyn’s Vegan’s statement. In it, she alleges that the restaurant’s operator had not paid utility bills totaling roughly $10,000 over eight months, had refused to formalize a lease with the building’s landlord despite repeated opportunities to do so, and had racked up tens of thousands of dollars in city code violations. The video raises specific claims that tell a very different story than the one Karelyn’s Vegan presented to its followers.
Beltgens begins the video by sharing that Karelyn’s Vegan entered the building not through a direct agreement with the landlord, but as a subtenant of her former business partner, Shaun Noonan, who had signed a lease for the space under their shared LLC, without adding Beltgens to it. When Noonan inevitably closed his Dixie Dharma concept in the building (and Market on South) in 2023, Beltgens says she was left in legal limbo: the bills were in her name, but she had no formal standing on the lease, which he kept under his name. And rather than break the lease, he subletted it out, just as he did in the former Market on South space in The Milk District.
According to Beltgens, the Fort Pitt landlord eventually stepped in to take direct control of the tenancy and attempted to negotiate a lease directly with Karelyn’s Vegan, after they had already been operating in the space. Beltgens says that effort went nowhere and that the owner, Jessica Davis, declined to respond to the landlord’s outreach on multiple occasions, including a deadline she was given to respond or vacate.
“All we want to do is make cake, pay our bills, and survive.”
– Celine Beltgens, Fort Pitt Bakery Café
Beltgens says the arrangement had always been that Karelyn’s Vegan would pay its share of shared utility costs, including dumpster fees, electricity, and related expenses that she says run between $1,500 and $2,000 a month. She claims Karelyn’s Vegan made one payment, then stopped. Beltgens says she has documentation of all of this, including spreadsheets tracking bill payments going back years, and video records of conversations with Davis about the billing arrangement.
Also, the centerpiece of Karelyn’s Vegan’s Instagram post was a description of a break-in, claiming someone entered the space, took items, and unplugged their security cameras beforehand. They said they spent time with law enforcement trying to understand what happened. The post made no mention of the billing dispute, the lease situation, or the landlord’s involvement.
Beltgens says there was no break-in. She says contractors entered Karelyn’s Vegan’s portion of the building at the landlord’s direction, after Davis had told the landlord she was leaving. She says the window Karelyn’s Vegan pointed to as evidence of a break-in was broken by those contractors during the process of clearing the space. She also alleges that Karelyn’s Vegan had been using an unsanctioned back apartment, which was described as a former residential unit that had not been renovated or sanitized, to prep food, something she says was witnessed by building staff and management.
The Orlando Shine was able to connect with Karelyn’s Vegan for a quote in response to Beltgens’ video, and received the following message, which they asked we share in full.
Thank you for reaching out. At this time, we’re not engaging in back-and-forth claims. We remain focused on our business and our community. We want to be clear: any suggestion that Karelyn’s Vegan has been or is being evicted is inaccurate. Our lease remains active, and how we move forward is entirely our decision. For accuracy, we encourage you to confirm the current status directly with Atrium Property Management. As it relates to any concerns regarding security or incidents on-site, those matters were documented and reported, and any related police reports are public record. We stand by our position and will not be addressing further claims publicly at this time. We appreciate you taking the time to reach out. — Karelyn’s Vegan
For accuracy, please include our statement in full and unedited.
– KAREYLYN’S VEGAN (@KARLYNSVEGAN)
We actually did speak with the property owner, who confirmed the thousands of dollars in code enforcement fees that have accrued over the past eight months for Karelyn’s operating out of an unlicensed kitchen ($500 a day), and that Davis had failed to pay rent for the past five months. They also shared that Davis had threatened physical harm to a representative of the landlord when she was questioned about paying past rent, which was caught on camera by Valhalla Bakery staff. We were also told that they were still welcome to stay onsite, if they paid their rent.
At the time of this post, the storefront was not operating and their equipment was stacked in the dining room.
Both accounts confirm that the situation at Fort Pitt had deteriorated significantly before the restaurant’s departure. Both suggest the building’s ownership situation was complicated and that the prior tenancy arrangement set up conditions for conflict.
Whatever the full truth of the dispute, Beltgens’ video makes clear that Valhalla Bakery has absorbed real financial damage over the past eight months. She says she has not taken a salary in five months. She says her staff has been put in uncomfortable and, at times, alarming situations. And she says she has been paying utility costs for the entire building while Karelyn’s Vegan operated without contributing to those costs.
As of publication, Karelyn’s Vegan’s post remained up and had not been updated to address Beltgens’ claims. Beltgens says she has video footage and documentation to back her account and intends to make more of it public.
