Cinnaminson Patch Letter To The Editor: Do You Want To Smell Burger King In Your Backyard?

The following is a letter sent to Cinnaminson residents and provided to Cinnaminson Patch by resident Anthony Balboni, who is speaking out against a proposed Burger King in a residential area:

Dear Neighbor:

My name is Anthony Balboni. Some of you may recognize my name as the local Realtor who owns Key Properties Real Estate formerly located in Cinnaminson at the New Albany Professional Building, and Currently in Delran at the Rt 130 and Hartford Road intersection.

I recently purchased the home at 2101 Arleigh for my former wife and our children to live in while my sons are not with me. We have been doing a lot of work improving the home recently. Also I am a long time resident of Cinnaminson having moved here in 1988.

I write to you today and hope you can take notice of an issue which should concern us all happening literally right in our backyards. Some of you may be aware, there was a certified letter sent to the home owners within 200 feet of the property at 2802 Rt. 130.

I have attached the letter I received in order to make all of you aware of this situation, not just the minimum legal required owners within 200 feet of the property. I only received the registered notice Aug. 30, and the meeting date is slated for only two weeks away. (With a major holiday and return to school in the midst!)

With these details stacked together it is likely no one would have been fully aware of the impact levied upon our neighborhood without someone bringing this into the light of day.

The current owner and seller who benefits from the sale is Colonial Bank, (you may recall the sarcastic ads the President of this Bank, Gerry Banmiller, places on KYW radio). He wants this pushed through since his bank was never able to make a go of this location.

This location has been a bank location for three decades or more. Burger King lawyers are attempting to “fast track” single meeting preliminary and final approval process, and push through a full approval for Burger King to set up shop and begin operations as soon as possible.

All this without full community awareness or involvement. I can say I have been a developer seeking variances and approvals in the past for my real estate projects, and have seen many “creative” ways to get approvals with as little community involvement as possible, and this application seem to be taking full advantage of very well planned schedule for this public meeting.

So let’s pay close attention and not be brushed aside in this process. Our voices matter!

If you do nothing, we will have a Burger King in our backyards, with all that comes with that, such as constant odor and drive through noise from the speakers, and car exhaust from the line.

The impact of this meeting to grant significant variances from applicable zoning regulations is that it will allow for a Burger King to be placed immediately in our backyards. It is necessary for the applicant to be granted these serious and un-ordinary variance and “relief” from adhering to the regular zoning regulations a typical “new” developer would have to adhere.

All this so they can retrofit a poorly suited location for their own financial gain, and with little or no regard at all for the impact upon our neighborhood. They are not entitled to these variances just because of their desire for them.

They have to meet essential elements in order to obtain these approvals and variances, such as positive criterion, and low or no impact to the community in a negative way and a positive impact of some sort.

They are changing the use of the building, as well as a complete modification of the site plan. It is not a foregone conclusion they be granted these approvals. You need to organize and show up and speak your mind at the meeting. Be heard!

WHY IS THIS IMPORTANT?

The past use as a bank is not nearly as intrusive as a business that will be cooking huge amounts of fatty beef and expelling the exhaust into the air near our homes. Banks and offices do not spew out these odors into our air.

From reading online, I have found many other close residential owners near other fast food type operations, including Burger Kings, where they have even had thin coatings of grease cover their cars and windshields from the particulates that escape the exhaust fans from these frying, broiling type of fast food operations, and from as far away as ¼ mile from the location. (Google Burger King air pollution).

Some franchise operators have been ordered by governmental agencies which protect the environment to use such things as Catalytic converters on the exhaust to capture the odors, but based on the accounts of the neighborhoods (particularly in Maryland) this catalytic device is marginally effective and only even marginally effective if operated and maintained properly, (which can be expensive and typically overlooked by the private restaurant company operating the franchises).

You might ask “How does this effect me personally?”

1. Quality of life in your own backyard. Many neighbors of facilities which broil large quantities of beef and serve it to fast food customers complain of things like the endless odor during all hours of operation, (typically early morning to very late evening), grease recycling containers, and trash receptacles with rotting food in them.
2. Noise and trash caused by large customer lines of cars in the drive through, drive through speaker noise, exhaust from idling cars, young kids hanging out in the parking lots, trash not making it to the receptacles and blowing into our yards.
3. Car traffic cutting through our neighborhood to get to the back side of the parking lot.
4. The higher likelihood of a fire caused by the type of operation proposed in comparison to the historical use of this location. And the effect the undersized lot and buffer areas could cause the contiguous owners in such a case as a fire.
5. The increased incidents of misdemeanors and loitering associated with fast food operations in comparison to offices or banks

BUT MOST IMPORTANTLY THE VALUE OF YOUR HOMES.

When you went looking for the home you now live in, would you have bought it if the odor of a fast food operation was lingering in the air? Would you have paid the asking price or used the smell and possibly the other effects noted above to make a lower offer? Or might you have simply crossed the home off your list? I am in the real estate business.

For 32 years now, I have seen many instances where the properties simply do not sell for what they are worth due to the type of issues this Burger King will bring rise to. Common sense tells us all this fact.

BURGER KING ALTERNATIVES

Burger King has alternative locations in Cinnaminson to place its operation. And locations which may be better suited than this undersized lot where they are looking to overburden the site as well as its neighbors.

This lot is best suited for a business with less impact that will not need so many “turning a blind eye” to the zoning rules and regulations. We are taxpayers. We deserve a fair notice of such meetings. We deserve to be heard about the impact it will have to our immediate community.

If we are not overlooked, or pushed aside in the decision process, (or under represented by our local government), we should be able to help Burger King and this franchise operator find a more suitable location, like across the street on Route 130, where the visibility, and access are better and the surrounding real estate is other businesses, and not residential family neighborhoods who will be severely negatively impacted by the “no-nod, wink wink” approval they are seeking.

Please attend the meeting. Do not be shy or expect anyone else to go for you.Not showing up allows them to pass this without real discussion.

Remind the zoning and planning board members, (and other elected officials you may know) we are voters, and we will be voting based on the quality of their representation in this particular issue. That might get their attention! (And if you are not registered to vote… please do so… it is your only voice in most cases.)

We should be able to raise the right issues to make them re-think this, but if not, I am willing to place $500 of my money in a fund to form a neighborhood association and will ask you to join and place $100 each in order to keep our homes and neighborhood free from the intrusion of smell and pollution from such an operation being placed in our backyards.

If this association is formed, we will hire a lawyer to represent our community (should our elected officials desire to align with a North Jersey corporation rather than their constituents), and raise all possible legal objections, and if necessary lay the groundwork to file suit in the future should air and noise pollution affect our neighborhood values and peaceful enjoyment of our homes free of odors and pollution, as it seems likely it will.

Citizen at large, and your new neighbor,

Anthony Balboni