When the New Year opens, the Transit Café, a work avenue for Tri-State Industries clients, will close after four years of operation. The reason is money.

“It wasn’t an easy decision,” Tim Nunnery, public relations/personnel director for the board of developmental disabilities, said on Thursday. “We have taken some time with it. We looked at the cost of our keeping it open with the profits.

Board of DD clients manned the café that was open for breakfast and lunch Monday through Friday. Expenses included the cost of food and salary for a manager.

“We used it as a jumping off point to get into the community,” Nunnery said. “It served its purpose well but the cost was there. We had to focus on our clients.”

On average four to six Tri-State Industries clients worked the morning and lunch shifts at the café that served sandwiches and salads. It was in the former Berg Building adjacent to the Transit Center.

Renovating the Berg on South Second Street and the Brumberg Building facing South Third Street is a project from a partnership between the Lawrence Economic Development Center and the Ironton-Lawrence County Community Action Organization. While parts of the Berg building have been restored, the county lost tax credits needed to start work on the Brumberg.

Tri-State clients come under the auspices of the board of DD that offers a place for former students of the Open Door school and other educational programs to work after graduation.

“When we looked at the budgets, we couldn’t keep it up,” Nunnery said.

If staff can be maintained, the café will stay open through Jan. 2.

“It had a good run,” Nunnery said.