I happen to live a couple of blocks away from where they want to put a Dunkin’ Donuts off North Fifth on Main Street, which I think would be a terrible idea.

Isn’t is fascinating how any time something is being built, it’s attributed to "they"?

"They’re" putting up a new building.

"They’re" doing construction to widen the highway.

"They" want to put windmills up on the hills.

If we could find out just who "they" are and hold "them" accountable for the inconvenience "they" cause us, dollars-to-donuts, we’d all be better off.

Oh yeah, donuts.

I don’t think there is any way the Oneonta city planning folks should allow "them" to move the Dunkin’ Donuts so close to my house.

I’m not just saying that because it might bring my property value down. No way. When we bought the joint more than seven years ago, we shrewdly chose a street with an auto body shop just a few houses away.

Ask any real estate agent what the melodious sound of dents being hammered out does for your property value.

Snuggling up against the body shop on one side and my house on the other are two edifices rented to college students during the school year.

I ask you, who wouldn’t want to shell out big bucks to buy my house and witness the nocturnal bleating of youthful scholars as they explore the intricacies of alcohol consumption amid mating rituals set to loud, discordant music?

Not to mention their insistence on parking in front of your house, leaving you to find a place for your vehicle in some distant elsewhere.

As you can see, living on my block is just a little bit of heaven. Still, I have no intention of moving any time soon, So, my objection to the Dunkin Donuts has little to do with property values.

Actually, I kinda like Dunkin Donuts. I’m a big fan of its egg and cheese bagel, and my kids think I’m a great guy if I bring home a dozen Boston Creme donuts.

It’s just that there’s this big turn in the road on Main Street right near where they want to put the place, and I have visions of somebody else’s kid getting hurt trying to cross the street to buy a chocolate glazed.

They (there’s that "they" again) would have to put a traffic light there, but I’m not sure it would make things any safer with cars emerging from the place without a lot of long-range visibility.

Another traffic light would also be a real pain on a road that already is getting more and more difficult to traverse.

Safety is my main concern, but a close second is the very nature of that part of Oneonta.

Right now, the Dunkin’ Donuts on my side of the city is conveniently located near the KFC chicken place and the post office. Why "they" would want to leave such an obviously plum location is beyond me.

What "they" want to do is tear down two houses near North Fifth Street and put the store there.

Really bad idea.

Why?

Just take a look at Southside, the fast-food and motel mecca in the town of Oneonta. I like a McDonald’s and Wendy’s as much as the next fellow, and because I’m a sucker for their chicken planks, my heart races with the impending arrival of a Long John Silver’s combination restaurant with a Taco Bell.

I guess those places have to be somewhere, and if it’s Southside, then so be it.

But I think it would be a genuine mistake to turn the residential nature of the area where "they" want to stick the Dunkin Donuts into another Southside.

Sure, Fox Hospital is right there. There’s a chiropractic business a block away, too, but that looks just like a house, and doesn’t have nearly the traffic the donut place would.

There just doesn’t seem to be any justification for allowing such a commercial enterprise to change the neighborhood so drastically.

Going way against the cliche, Oneonta’s cops don’t seem to spend an inordinate amount of time hanging around donut shops. So, there wouldn’t even be the benefit of enhanced police presence in the area.

Sure, there are far more important things going on in the world than where a donut shop is allowed to locate. But in this little corner of the world, it would be inconvenient, community-changing and very possibly dangerous to allow what "they" want.

In this case, a donut is just a big zero.

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Sam Pollak is editor of The Daily Star. He can be reached at spollak@thedailystar.com or at (607) 432-1000, ext. 208.