The Wheaton Way K-Mart will soon join the area’s vacant box stores.

The store will close May 9 and begin its “going out of business” sale Feb. 21, said Kim Freely, a spokeswoman for Sears Holdings Corporation, K-Mart’s parent company.

Bremerton Mayor Patty Lent said she is most concerned about the unemployment the closure will cause, plus the surplus of empty storefronts around the city.

“I hate to see anything we can’t sustain at this time,” she said.

The K-Mart, at 4210 Wheaton Way, employs 55 associates, Freely said.