Last night, about 20 people endured the June Borough Council Meeting that was convened by council president, Michael Beury at 7:00 pm and adjourned three and one-half hours later. Citizens, representatives of the Historic Columbia Market House, current and former Market House stand holders endured the lengthy and often emotionally charged meeting which included theater-like, “on-again; off-again” gavel wrapping by the person with the gavel.

Much of the “citizen comments” part of the meeting was directed to the recently enacted Borough decision to remove vendor parking from the Third Street parking lot near the Market House which was previously designated as parking for the vendors. That lot has now been allocated for Borough employee parking during daytime hours. Market House vendors have been directed to park in the lot at the base of Locust Street.

All members of the council, the mayor, the Borough’s solicitor, Borough Manager and Borough finance manager were in attendance.

The agenda (page one):

The agenda (page two):

The meeting was adjourned at 10:32 p.m., but many who attended the meeting clustered for small-group conversations outside the Borough Hall following the meeting.

Following the meeting, a person asked this writer: “Are they (the meetings) always like this?”

Because of the duration of the meeting, we were not able to review notes from the meeting fully. Columbia news, views & reviews will have a subsequent article about the meeting later this week.