Glens Falls Chronicle Serving the Glens Falls/Lake George region; Warren, Washington and northern Saratoga counties since 1980
By Gordon Woodworth, Chronicle News Editor
“Buy the Burger King and put up a hotel or convention center.”
That’s what some have suggested amid the debate on how Glens Falls should spend its $10-million state grant for the Downtown Revitalization.
It’s an idea apparently going nowhere.
“To acquire that property and move them out, it would cost all of the $9.7-million,” Ed Bartholomew, the city economic development czar, said at the Oct. 12 meeting of the Revitalization Initiative.
Mr. Bartholomew urged people to realize that the Burger King also provides low-cost food to many senior citizens, especially residents of Stichman Towers and the Cronin High Rise.
A randomly encountered resident of the Cronin High Rise made that point emphatically when this reporter sought input on how the $10-million should be spent.
Mr. Bartholomew said the franchise restaurant, owned by the Carrols Corporation out of Syracuse, “is one of the top-selling Burger Kings in New England.”
The Burger King is also said to be the biggest sales tax generator in the City.
So Carrols is making money, the City is making money, and Sand Dollar Ltd., the Islip, N.Y. corporation that bought the land (1.36 acres) and the building for $2.45-million in January, is making money.
At the DRI meeting, Mr. Bartholomew said he has had discussions with officials from Carrols Corp. officials and Sand Dollar Ltd., but didn’t indicate they were at all serious.
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