All the councilors, the mayor, the borough manager, the borough’s finance manager, a recorder and a dozen or so persons attended the monthly borough council “meeting of the whole.”

This meeting was another marathon-like event as the council president called the meeting to order at 6:02 pm; the closing gavel tap came at 9:29 pm. During the evening the councilors and those in attendance sometimes strained to hear what was being said by some of the councilors and the borough manager. Despite a few microphones at the councilors’ tables, it was difficult for those in attendance to hear some of the discussions.

“Columbia is becoming an antiques destination. ” said one of the assembly of antiques dealers in the participants’ gallery. Most of the citizens who attended last night’s meeting were members of the Columbia antiques sector; others in the gallery included one or two citizens, business owners and media. The antiques dealers were at the meeting to address their reservations and observations with the council’s “proposed ordinance 829: License and Regulations for Pawn Brokers, Antique Dealers and Second Hand Dealers.”

Agenda – page 01

Agenda – page 02

Several of the dealers and retail operations spoke to the issues by relating the growth of the number of antique stores now operating in the borough. They questioned the inclusion of antique dealer sand the definitions of many of the words used in the proposed legislation. Some suggested that casting antique dealers into the same lot as pawn shops was not well thought through.

This topic has been a lingering one: On November 22, 2011, Columbia news, views & reviews wondered: “Jesse’s back with a disturbing posting at columbiapaonline; we are glad that columbiapaonline is back but we wish his first post in a while would have been on a different topic. There is a Pennsylvania State Law concerning the licensing of pawnbrokers. Based on Jesse’s post, we wonder whether these business operations are following state and federal laws concerning sales tax and firearms. We hope that these newly surfaced pawn operations in Columbia are (1) licensed and (2) monitored by Columbia’s codes and police departments. We’re glad your health is improved; welcome back, Jesse.”

Columbia news, views & reviews reported this from the July 2012 council meeting of the whole: “A second advertised issue that was advertised for Council’s review for approval met with more debate among several of the councilors and the mayor. Because there were some ill-defined phrases and unclear definitions about which businesses would be impacted by the Ordinance #829 as presented, the councilors decided to take the Ordinance Amendment back into committee for language revision. The ordinance would require licensing and regulating certain actions “for Pawn Brokers, Antique Dealers and Second Hand Dealers.”

They requested that the councilors revisit the proposed legislation to bring it more in line with the state’s licensing regulations concerning the identification and licensing of pawn shops and “buyers and sellers” of gold, silver, precious metals and stones. [NOTE: This legal notice republished in Columbia news, views & reviews recently is indicative of one of the requirements of the state’s law:

LEGAL NOTICE, published in the Lancaster Intelligencer Journal/New Era, July 21, 2012 – “NOTICE  OF  RENEWAL APPLICATION FOR  A PAWNBROKER  LICENSE Notice is given  that  Pawn Plus,  Inc. will on 8/21/12 submit to the PA Dept of Banking an application for renewal licensure of a pawnbroker office at this location which is as follows: 46 W King St, Lancaster PA, Lancaster County. All interested persons may file written comments in favor of or in opposition to the application with the pawnbroker hearing officer, PA Dept of Banking, 17 N 2nd St, 13th floor, Harrisburg PA 17101. All comments to be considered must be received by the Dept within 30 days from the date of this newspaper publication.”]

At the end of the discussion of the topic, most of those representing the antique dealers left the meeting. The remainder of the meeting followed the agenda roadmap. Due to time constraints (because of the lack of time from last night’s adjournment until now), columbia news, view & reviews will touch on some of the items discussed at a future date.