Neighbor to Cops: Stop 'Illegal' Lemonade Stand

TJ Guerrero, 12, runs his own stand in Dunedin, Fla.
By Neal Colgrass,  Newser Staff
Posted Aug 24, 2014 4:10 PM CDT
Updated Aug 24, 2014 4:30 PM CDT
Neighbor to Cops: Stop 'Illegal' Lemonade Stand
   (Shutterstock)

Nothing like an entrepreneurial kid running a lemonade stand on the lawn—unless you're his angry neighbor, that is. Doug Wilkey of Dunedin, Fla., has been complaining for two years about 12-year-old TJ Guerrero's lemonade stand next door, Gawker reports. Wilkey emailed City Hall several times and reached out to law enforcement, saying the "illegal" enterprise is causing too much noise, traffic, illegal parking, and excess garbage, all of which lowers his property value:

  • "If this were a once a year event by a couple kids to earn a little money for a holiday or something, I would not have a problem with it," he wrote in an email. "I am very worried about the value of my home, which is why I built in a residential area, not a business area."

When TJ set up shop this summer, Wilkey wrote the city that he was back "AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!" Indeed, TJ runs the operation from 3pm to 7pm on summer days, running to paused cars with $1 lemonades and 50-cent cookies, the Tampa Bay Times reports. He also sells alone after Wilkey complained about kids using profanity, lighting fireworks, and damaging his parked truck by running into it on a bicycle. But police, who have visited twice, found that neighbors were OK with it. And customers aren't complaining: "I tried the strawberry before and it's perfect," says one. "That's what it's about. He's willing to work." TJ doesn't disagree: "It's all about the profit," he says. (More lemonade stories.)

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