The Moreno Valley Mall could reopen as early as Wednesday, March 4 if officials sign off on new fire doors at the mostly shuttered shopping center, the city’s attorney said Tuesday evening, March 3. The city’s inspectors met with mall representatives at 3 p.m. Tuesday and were told all the neede d fire-rated doors — designed to contain flames and smoke during a blaze — will be installed tonight or Wednesday, City Attorney Steven Quintanilla said via text. Most of the mall has been closed since Feb. 19 to address nine fire code violations, eight of which have since been resolved. The violation pertaining to fire doors is the only hurdle left. If the new doors “are fully functional” per the fire code, “the closure order will be lifted to open the mall immediately,” Quintanilla said. “This could happen as early as (Wednesday) morning depending on the mall’s progress … with installing the doors.” In an unprecedented move, the city shut down the mall off the 60 Freeway due to what officials described as “numerous health and safety code violations (that) have been identified as posing significant risks to tenants and customers alike.” JCPenney, Macy’s and Harkins Theatres were allowed to stay open because their fire response systems are independent of the mall’s, officials said. The closure has idled hundreds if not thousands of mall employees and business owners caught off-guard by the city’s decision. Many have said they’re not sure how they’ll pay for rent and other basic needs and urged the city to reopen the mall as soon as possible. “I’ve worked my heart (and) my soul into this space, and I’ve sacrificed so much — over $100,000 in my 4,000 square feet,” Entycé Boutique and Beauty Bar owner Sheena McGill told Moreno Valley council members during a Thursday, Feb. 26, special meeting about the mall. “ … We have so many people that are not able to go back to work because of doors and some lighting.” About 1,100 people worked at the mall in 2024, making it Moreno Valley’s 11th largest employer, according to a city document. Moreno Valley city staff said the mall’s closure is entirely management’s fault. During the Feb. 26 council meeting, Fire Chief Jesse Park framed the closure as not spur of the moment, but the result of mall management’s indifference to a litany of serious problems despite multiple inspections and warnings in recent years. At one point, inspectors found pallets of highly flammable hand sanitizer being illegally stored in a vacant portion of the mall, Park said. Other issues include storage blocking fire exits and removed electrical lighting, the chief added. On Feb. 19, the fire marshal went to the mall to collect records “they didn’t have” despite being told they were needed, Park said. He said mall staff “freely admitted that the exit doors were broken, the alarm panel didn’t work and the generators didn’t work.” On March 20, 2025, the city’s fire marshal started a fire watch “to continually monitor potential fire hazards associated with any construction activities at the Mall,” read a Jan. 16 letter to mall management from Quintanilla and Moreno Valley City Manager Brian Mohan. On Instagram, mall owner Matt Ilbak wrote that the mall “was surprised by the city’s actions.” The city raised concerns about the mall “just over a month ago” and the mall “was in regular communication with the city” about scheduling inspections and testing, Ilbak wrote. At the Feb. 26 meeting, mall attorney John Stephens said the mall shouldn’t have been red-tagged and that the city’s documents “were procedurally deficient.” Related links Moreno Valley Mall could reopen as soon as Tuesday, city attorney says City offers to fix Moreno Valley Mall’s fire code violations to speed up reopening Closure is Moreno Valley Mall managers’ fault, city officials say at meeting Moreno Valley Mall workers struggle to get by after closure Moreno Valley Mall owed city almost $700,000 as of January, letter states Most of Moreno Valley Mall closing; city says conditions are unsafe Fire code issues aren’t the only problems the city has with the two-story, 87-acre mall, which opened in 1992 and is owned by IGP Business Group. Besides shops and restaurants, the mall also is home to a school and city library branch. Moreno Valley also plans to build the city’s first museum inside the mall’s former Sears building. According to the January letter from Quintanilla and the city manager, the mall has racked up 88 code violations since 2019 and owes almost $700,000 to the city for code infractions and on-site law enforcement services. The letter also describes a pattern of problems, from unauthorized construction and events to cracked pavement, dead landscaping and faulty escalators. Despite this, council members, while defending the closure, insisted they wanted the mall to reopen as soon as it could. To that end, the city in late February offered to hire its own contractor to fix the mall’s fire code issues, with the mall being billed for the cost of that work though a special assessment. ...read more read less