CLEVELAND — Cooking is in Kolnita Riggins-Walker’s blood. And her restaurant is all about family.
Doc’s on Harvard opened last spring on Cleveland’s southeast side in a small brick building where Kolnita’s father-in-law ran a dental office for decades. Pictures of the dentist and his wife hang on the walls in a space that feels more like a home than a business.
It’s a rare fine-dining locale in the Lee-Harvard neighborhood, a Black middle-class stronghold that’s seen better days. And it’s an early example of how civic leaders hope to bring prosperity – businesses and residents – back to overlooked parts of the city.
“The rich history of Lee-Harvard is just that,” Kolnita said. “I’m not doing something brand new. I’m just bringing back something that hasn’t been here for decades.”
On Tuesday, she and her staff hosted a celebratory lunch for the many partners who made Doc’s on Harvard possible. Dozens of people, from lawmakers to representatives for the Cleveland Browns, munched on her Riggins' Southern Fusion Rolls – a family recipe.
Doc’s on Harvard is the first business to benefit from the Southeast Side Promise, Mayor Justin Bibb’s ambitious plan to revive three long-overlooked neighborhoods: Lee-Harvard, Mount Pleasant and Union-Miles.
Last year, the administration and City Council set aside $15 million in federal pandemic relief money as a down payment for that plan.
Now that money is flowing to home repair; major projects, like the planned redevelopment of former Cleveland school sites; and business districts like the one where Doc’s sits.
“We need private investment, really, to make it happen. But the city needs to be first,” said Marvin Owens, the mayor’s senior strategist for the southeast side. “The city needs to be able to establish and kind of create a market, if you will. And so we’re thrilled that this first investment is doing just that. … One investment here is now sparking a lot of excitement down the street and around the corner, as well. That’s what we want.”
The nearby intersection of Harvard Avenue and Lee Road is the launchpad for another plan to shore up fragile neighborhoods. Cleveland Neighborhoods Progress is helping landlords fix up storefronts and prepare them for prospective tenants.
The nonprofit also is buying up and renovating homes, in hopes of attracting new families and shutting out predatory investors.
Cleveland Neighborhood Progress is focused on so-called “middle neighborhoods” – pockets of the city that are teetering on a tightrope between growth and decline. That’s not just Lee-Harvard. It’s also Collinwood, Old Brooklyn and West Park.
“If our main streets are thriving, our side streets are thriving,” said Tania Menesse, the nonprofit’s president and CEO.
“Places like Lee-Harvard, that have traditionally had the highest voting rates, that have the most activity from residents, that have high homeownership rates, are the perfect places to bring vibrancy back to,” she added.
Kolnita and her husband, William Walker, grew up nearby.
William remembers visiting his father’s office, which moved to 16615 Harvard Ave. in 1975. His dad served communities where families didn’t always have the money to pay for dental care. But the dentist never sent an account to debt collectors. He bartered instead.
Kolnita and William, who co-own Doc’s on Harvard, have been together for 33 years. She launched a catering business in the late 1990s and has worked at high-end restaurants and hotels.
"My mother's a chef. My grandmother's a chef. Her mother's a chef. My uncle's a chef," she said.
William spent his career with Allstate Corp. but retired to help his wife realize her dream.
In 2020, during the pandemic, they moved back to the Cleveland area from Chicago. William’s father was in his 90s – but he still wanted to go into the office.
One day, Kolnita popped into the building to check the mail. She stopped just inside.
“God took me in an open vision,” she said. “It was like I was watching a movie, and I saw this beautiful restaurant.”
She went home and told her father-in-law. “And he said, ‘Wow, I always wanted to own a restaurant,’” Kolnita said. “So here we are.”
The couple started construction in 2021. Then tragedy struck.
Their son Trent, the youngest of five children, took his own life in early 2022. He was 21 years old. His parents say the pandemic – the trauma and isolation – was too much for him.
Six weeks later, William’s father died.
“He passed six weeks after Trent did, due to a broken heart,” Kolnita said.
She and her husband found hope in their business, which garnered support from the Cleveland Browns and the Harvard Community Services Center, a neighborhood group.
The finished space is filled with reminders of the loved ones they’ve lost. Out back, on a patio that’s still taking shape, a picture of Trent is part of a colorful mural that wraps around the restaurant’s cooler space.
“Of all the work that we’ve had done on this building … this means the most to me and my wife,” William said. “Because it’s our baby boy.”
The restaurant and lounge is named for William’s father – “Doc.” The script on the sign outside is based on the dentist’s handwriting.
Kolnita and William kept the same phone number that the dental practice used for roughly 60 years at multiple locations.
“About once a month, somebody will call in looking for dental work,” William said with a laugh. “Coming and trying to schedule an appointment, or what have you.”
Doc never got to see the finished product. But William knows how he would react.
“He would be sitting in there, watching people. Smiling,” William said. “Holding a martini up. It’s called the Doc’s Martini, actually. And he would just say ‘How sweet it is.’ That was his line.”
So far, Kolnita says, the response from the community has been overwhelming. She has regulars who stop in for the whitefish, the most popular dish on a dinner menu where appetizers start at $15, and entrees start at $33.
“Lee-Harvard will not look anything like this in two to three years,” she predicted. “It will be transformed.”
Now, she wants the metamorphosis of her modest building to send a message.
“Hope,” Kolnita said. “I want people to know that there’s hope. And that whatever their dream is and whatever it is that they’re desiring to do – go for it. Go for it. Run after it. Chase it. Pursue it. Make it happen. Because you can do it.”
