RAYMOND – Joe Bruno, chief executive officer of the 11-store Maine-based chain of Community Pharmacies and also a Raymond selectman, has announced that the company’s branch on Route 302 in Raymond will close May 14, citing a dispute with the landlord.

Bruno said while other tenants in the Raymond Shopping Center located on Route 302 are receiving rent reductions, he was refused a reduced rate on his lease agreement, which was up for renewal this year.

“Everyone was getting a rent reduction, because it’s not going well in that mall. I found that out and asked the landlord if we could receive a rent reduction and he refused. He said we’d need to collect more from you,” Bruno said.

Raymond Shopping Center landlord Mark Accousti said there is only one tenant getting a reduced rent, the purpose of which was to prevent that business, which Accousti won’t name, from going under. He denied wanting to raise Community Pharmacies’ rent, saying instead that the pharmacy hadn’t received a rent increase for the 10 previous years.

“My only comment is that Community Pharmacies has been a great partner and we’re really sad to see them go. They’ve had the same rent for 10 years, and we were going to continue with that rate, and that’s the fact. There was no rent increase,” Accousti said.

Accousti also said he has never charged Community Pharmacies for other costs, including plowing, taxes, and common area maintenance, in the decade the pharmacy, headquartered in Augusta, has leased space at the plaza.

Bruno, a former longtime state representative, replied, saying, “Mark wanted me to pay more than what I am paying now. He probably didn’t (say) that I needed to put $8,000 toward replacing air conditioners and a furnace that didn’t work because he would not do it without me paying toward it. It’s true I didn’t have a rent hike in 10 years because I told him until he fixed the parking lot and the plaza like he told me he would do, I was not going to pay more.”

When asked how he knew others were receiving lower rents, Bruno replied: “I did speak to the other tenants in the plaza, and I know what has been going on.”

Bruno said the main reason he requested a rent reduction is due to the weakened state of the Raymond Shopping Center, which he attributes to the closure of the former Raymond Food Market several years ago.

“It hasn’t been the same since then,” Bruno said. “This is a dying mall. We were promised a new parking lot with new striping, but nothing’s happened. The supermarket was a destination, and that helped us tremendously. This used to be a profitable store. Now, we’re a break-even store at best.”

Accousti said times are tough and “feels bad” the shopping center isn’t what it once was. But he has hope it’ll return to its former profitable ways.

“I can understand Joe’s concerned; so are we,” Accousti said Wednesday.

Bruno said closing the store will affect the “couple thousand” customers who have prescriptions at the Raymond location. As a result of the closure, customer records are being forwarded to Hannaford Supermarket in North Windham.

Bruno, who said he has no intention of building or moving into another Raymond location, said 98 percent of Community Pharmacies’s sales come from filling pharmaceutical prescriptions and selling medical equipment.

“I live in Raymond. When it’s your own hometown, it hurts. So this isn’t easy for me personally. I wanted to have a pharmacy in town,” Bruno said.

The Community Pharmacies in Raymond currently has seven or eight employees, Bruno said, four of whom will be given jobs at other Community Pharmacies locations in Gorham and Randolph, outside Gardiner. The remaining employees, Bruno said, could be given an opportunity to work at Hannaford ‘s pharmacy in Windham.

“As far as I know, Hannaford will be interviewing, since I imagine they will need help absorbing the new customers,” Bruno said.