January
26,
2007
Editorial
/ The Daily Item
James Cowdell, the former Lynn City
Council president who now heads the city’s Economic
and Industrial Corp., is on the mark in turning the heat
up on the Athanas family to either sell or redevelop
its shuttered Central Avenue property.
The former Anthony’s Hawthorne
Restaurant, once a landmark North Shore eatery, is now
an urban blight, a dilapidated corner building smack
dab in the heart of the downtown and vacant for five
years.
Wig Zamore, an advisor to the Athanas
family, which also owns Anthony’s Pier 4 restaurants in Boston and Swampscott
(the former Hawthorne by The Sea), said the family has
no immediate plan to sell or redevelop the Lynn property.
He said since the taxes on the property are current, the
City is powerless to decide what happens with it. Zamore
also said the family has little incentive to do anything
with the building since there’s no consistent development
plan for the downtown.
That logic is flawed, however, since a development plan
is exactly what Cowdell, in his new role, is charged with
creating.
“My job is to move the business community forward
and I see this as a major hurdle to that,” Cowdell
said.
The City and the EDIC should give
the property owners an ultimatum and a reasonable deadline.
And, if that deadline passes with no action, the EDIC
board of directors and City Council should consider Cowdell’s
proposal to explore taking the property by eminent domain.
The late Anthony Athanas, the family
patriarch and nationally renowned restaurateur; opened
Anthony’s Hawthorne,
his first of five restaurants, in 1937. He enjoyed great
success here, and that success allowed him to open Anthony’s
Pier 4 in Boston, which became the highest grossing restaurant
in the nation and remains a key Hub destination.
The Anthony’s Hawthorne site
today is hardly a tribute to its namesake, and has become
a hindrance to the city that gave him his start. The
Athanas family should realize that, and do something
with the property to help keep downtown Lynn moving forward.
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