Cherry Hill municipal clerk Nancy Saffos said the prices of liquor licenses across the township "have been slowly escalating. The only surprise to me is that it is a record in the state."
Licenses have fetched $1.2 million in Freehold, about $1 million in Princeton and $650,000 in the Meadowlands, according to the Trenton-based restaurant association.
Chris Fifis, owner of Ponzio's diner in Cherry Hill, said earlier that the Garden State Park developers involved in the redevelopment of the former Cherry Hill racetrack site offered him more than $1 million for his liquor license last year.
New Jersey's rules allow municipalities to issue one on-premise liquor license for every increase of 3,000 people in the population and one off-premise - liquor store - license per 7,500 people.
Saffos said yesterday that she doesn't expect Cherry Hill's population to increase enough by the 2010 census to allow for the issuance of a new liquor license. So the licenses already issued become more valuable and competition for them more intense.
Some license owners - seeking greater return on their investments - try to use a single license to cover multiple restaurants. The state allows that as long as the restaurants are in adjoining buildings on property owned by the license holder.
Saffos said she has not received any notification that PREIT wants the license to cover multiple restaurants. Joseph Coradino, PREIT retail president, was not available for comment yesterday.
Longo's attorney, Igor Sturm, confirmed the news of the sale to PREIT and the township's approval.
Most New Jersey towns have a fixed number of licenses, and so businesses hoping to sell alcohol must obtain an existing one.
