Dear council members,
I’m dismayed that we’re still talking about this subject. It’s obvious to the naked eye that A&M BBQ is creating daily pollution. If my car was blowing grey smoke like their smokers, the chief would pull me over and cite me. I visited Austin, Texas recently where I dined at a restaurant with the same equipment.
The exception? Their smokers had custom filtration systems. A cost of doing business, much like the fire suppression hood and giant grease trap my partner and I paid to install when I co-owned a restaurant.
A&M could have started a crowd funding campaign to raise the money needed to source a similar filtration system. Instead they complained of unfair treatment. They rallied their supporters and created a court of public opinion rather than solving the obvious problem like business owners. The rules are clear. The rules have been clear from the start and somehow the owners of this establishment have you all snowed.
It’s time for the city council to do their job. This has gone on way too long, putting the nearby residents, the animals, the Laguna in harms way for more than a year. A&M has a now booming business and has had ample time to find a more appropriate location or to solve the problem of air quality. It seems they have done neither. They should not be granted a rezone simply because they failed to run their business properly.
Period.
Sent from my iPhone