today’s news and information gleanings from here and there!

Quote for today… “I think my collar’s too tight!” – Michael Beury, council president, blurted when asked following his coughing spurt during last night’s council meeting.

At last night’s council meeting, the mayor read a proclamation in recognition of Catholic Schools Week. Two students, representing Our Lady of the Angels school accepted the proclamation for the school.

• National Catholic Schools Week is the annual celebration of Catholic education in the United States. It starts the last Sunday in January and runs all week, which in 2014 is January 26 to February 1.

• “Columbia Borough council reinstated and expanded property tax abatements on Monday, Jan. 13.” – MyColumbiaNews

• Last night, the council approved several ordinances following the public hearing about the passage of L.E.R.T.A in the borough. The borough manager commented on the need for L.E.R.T,A. and several members of the Columbia Economic Development Corporation and Matthew Sternberg, Executive Director Lancaster County Housing and Redevelopment also spoke to the need for embracing L.E.R.T.A. One of the ordinances passed affixed the boundaries of “deteriorated” properties as the entire borough. Of the fewer than five citizens in the gallery, none spoke against the passage of L.E.R.T.A.

• By declaring the entire borough as “deteriorated,” this ordinance essentially identifies “any industrial, commercial or other business property owned by an individual, association or corporation, and located in a deteriorating area, as hereinafter provided, or any such property which has been the subject of an order by a government agency requiring the unit to be vacated, condemned or demolished by reason of noncompliance with laws, ordinance or regulations.” – 72 P.S. § 4724

• The borough manager said that unless the school board adopts L.E.R.T.A. at next week’s meeting, the ordinances become meaningless.

• Is LE.R.T.A. right for every community? “Supervisor Stephen Kulla said he worries that properties eligible for LERTA will have an unfair advantage over businesses not in the approved zones. ‘You’re helping somebody at the same time you’re hurting someone competitively,’ he said.” – Herald-Mail, Hagerstown, MD

• Rebuffed again: Two members of the Market House Trust were in the gallery at last night’s meeting; one made an appeal to the council to reopen the budget and consider a community development allocation to support the Market House. The mayor spoke up saying the borough needs to support the Market House because of the $1,000,000 grant it had received from the state to resurrect it. He said that taxpayer funds, “not Columbia’s” had been invested into the Market House. A subsequent motion by a councillor to reopen the budget to consider the issue was voted down in a 4-3 council vote.

• Body found at Middlecreek: homocide – WGAL-TV

• Wired to shoot: “Man fatally shot at Fla. theater over texting” – The Tampa Tribune

• From one trough to another at $100K plus – York Daily Record

• Why not recognize public school education week? Fair’s fair, shouldn’t the mayor and the borough ought to honor public education week with a proclamation too. Or Christian Education Week?

• There’s a LEGAL NOTICE in today’s Intelligencer Journal/Lancaster New Era announcing a zoning board hearing on January 29 about a special exception for a wireless company to “construct a wireless communications facility at 1020 Blunston Street in a Light Industrial (LI) zoned district.”