Judge Ronald Bookbinder in Burlington County ruled in favor of Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust and Moorestown Township for the liquor license referendums to remain on the ballot in the November general elections.
Plaintiff William Cox, also a resident of Moorestown Township, filed a lawsuit against the county and the township solicitor for allowing a referendum question submitted by Pennsylvania Real Estate Investment Trust to be placed on the Nov. 8 general election ballot.
Cox submitted a lawsuit claiming that PREIT did not wait the necessary five years to resubmit a referendum question to be placed on the ballot. In 2007 Moorestown voters roundly defeated a question that would have allowed liquor licenses to be sold in the township for restaurants to sell liquor.
Bookbinder ruled in favor of the defendants, citing that the 2011 referendum questions on the ballot are consistent with previous decisions put forth by the Legislature and Appellate Divisions. Bookbinder said that if he ruled otherwise, he would be overruling the Legislature and Appellate Division, which include former Gov. Alfred E. Driscoll.
Cox has already said he will appeal the decision at the Appellate Division.
“I hope I will have a better chance at the Appellate Division,” Cox said after the hearing last week.
Township Solicitor Tom Coleman said the decision was in line with the township’s decision to place the referendum questions on the November ballot.
“The questions will move forward and be decided by township voters, rather than just one resident,” Coleman said.
In 2007 Moorestown voters roundly defeated a question that would have allowed liquor licenses to be sold in the township for restaurants to sell liquor.
In 2007, the question that was voted down read as follows:
“Shall the retail sale of all kinds of alcoholic beverages, for consumption on the licensed premises by the glass or other open receptacle pursuant to chapter one of the Title Intoxicating Liquors of the Revised Statutes (s.33: 1–1 et seq.), be permitted in this municipality?”
The question was voted down by a vote of 4,202 to 2,559 in 2007.
Four years later, the question that has been submitted for this year’s ballot reads as follows:
“Shall the sale of all alcoholic beverages at retail, except for consumption on railroad trains, airplanes and boats, and the issuance of any retail licenses, except as aforesaid, pursuant to chapter one of the Title Intoxicating Liquors of the Revised Statutes (§ 33:1–1 et seq.) be permitted in this municipality?”
The question also has a second qualifier that asks the township voters to approve the sale of the liquor licenses to retailers only located “on the same tax lot as an indoor shopping mall in the SRC zoning district.”
Cox submitted that the questions were not different enough from the original 2007 question and should never have been accepted by the township solicitor and Burlington County Clerk Timothy Tyler.
