Borough Council - Regular Meeting

Call to order. The Columbia Borough Council regular meeting. For July 14th, 2026 7 PM. Have a roll call please.

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Here. Thank you. Thank you. Invocation. Invocation tonight will be done by Ted Turner, Fred Thomas.

Kevin McFarland. We gather here this evening with gratitude for the opportunity to serve our community. We ask that you bless each person here with wisdom, patience, and compassion. Guide our discussion so that they may be fair, respectful, and focused on the common good. Help us to listen with open hearts, speak with integrity, and act with courage. May our decision today bring unity, hope, and progress for all who call this city home. We ask for strength to lead with humility and vision and always mindful of those we represent. I pray that you guide us always, satisfy the needs that need to be met during this meeting, strengthen us as we make tough decisions. I pray that we will be like a well-watered garden, like a spring whose water is never faithful. I pray that we will be fruitful. Father, please guide us so that this meeting will be productive. Let us be effective and decisive. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

yes I would like to make a motion to add the following to the top of new business consider approval of ordinance to remove data centers from light business or submission to municipal and county planning commissions This is the ordinance that I had sent to all of council last week. So you should all have copies of it in your email.

All right, I've looked and read that and I second that letter.

What did you say?

I have a motion to add agenda or add to new business I under new business I yeah I'll read it again consider approval of ordinance to remove data centers from light business or submission to municipal and county planning commissions

I have a motion by Councilman Beyer, seconded by Councilman Grigory. All in favor say aye. Aye.

Aye.

No. No.

No comment.

No need. This is a comment.

One person .

I have approval. I have a motion to approve the agenda. So moved. Second. I have a motion by Councilman Murphy, seconded by Councilman Deasy, to approve the agenda with aye. All in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye.

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evening council good evening residents i am just going to speak shortly tonight very shortly on chief hart's ability to do her job i understand we're short-staffed i understand a lot of things but approximately a month or so ago there was a hit and run right up from our house waited around for an hour and a half, two hours, the victims, for police response. There was none coming. They looked into it. They reported it. They were told to go on a website. Nobody was coming because they're short-staffed. Just last night, very trivial thing, but I don't like to see stuff that's a blatant, an absolute blatant disrespect for authority. Last night, I call it the drug house across the street from us. Down the street from us, there's another house that is quite rowdy. Officers are aware of which house I'm speaking of, but It was one of those two, I'm assuming, that came from the drug house, parked directly in front of our car, which there is a break for a fire hydrant between the front of our car and the back of, I'm at 250, probably 254. 252 is closed off to parking on the street because of the fire hydrant. Somebody parked there last night. Usually it's loud, high radio plaring, kids screaming. We're talking 10, 11 o'clock at night. They parked there. They were there until this morning. I called at approximately 11.15, reported it to the Columbia PD line, and I went to bed at 2 o'clock, and two hours and 45 minutes later, I don't believe, unless I missed it, I don't believe that I was sitting right there by the window. there was any response I know they're shorthanded we just hired an officer early part of this month but I'm told the PD in town here is strangled right now as far as having their hands tied money is that in fact an issue I don't know I'm asking Can you explain that, or can any member of council care to comment on that? How is the money situation for her to get the resources that she needs? Because if this is the way it is, I've always, always been a big proponent of our own PD, even though it eats up a lot of our municipal budget. I've always been a big proponent of having it because there's too much going on in this town to turn it over. But if these are the response times that we're getting in, nothing against you, Chief. Nothing against you at all. I just think there's something going on here that we're not aware of. And if this is the response that we're getting, when citizens or residents call, we might as well go to a territorial PD because what are we getting? As residents, we need to have safety. Mayor Lutz is a big one for safety, safety in the town, citizen safety. If anything, I think it's gotten worse. And I'm talking the last year or two. I'm not just talking the last one or two months. talking for a while and I just want to I'd like some kind of explanation as to why we don't seem to be kept safe unless you pull out a 38 you can't be assured that somebody's gonna be safe can anybody please somebody comment

Mr. Frederick, I have a question for you. I'm not exactly understanding your concern. You're stating it's a matter of money or funds being withheld? I'm questioning that. The police budget has been approved. The police officers are on the street. The police officers are doing their job as they always have. So I'm not understanding what you're...

I'm questioning why such a slow... Police response to certain issues.

That question will go to Chief Arnn.

Goes where?

To the chief. The chief is in charge of the police department. She's here. I'm asking her.

I'm asking any member if there's anything that is going on that explains this.

So I'll explain this, sir. So right now we have 12 officers on patrol.

So there's three officers on patrol. 99% of the time, there's two people working. I would have to look into the call last night. I don't know if they were on another call. I will say that I just pulled the stats. July 1st to the 14th, we've had 517 calls.

That's for two officers. We've had a shooting. We've had a homicide. We have one detected. So our response time is a good priority. If there's a more serious call, the two officers on our own duty are tied up with that, whether it's a verbal domestic or a fight. So I would have to look into that time frame last night to get a better answer, but I can say that they've been extremely busy with two people on the train. It's not safe. It's not safe for them. It's not safe for citizens.

Two people.

Two officers for 10,000 residents.

We need to get more officers ASAP. Whatever it takes, I think everybody in this room would agree with me on that. If we're paying an exorbitant amount for protection, We need to see something for our money. And I don't know, Tom, I don't know if the department's hands are being tied or what, financially or in any other way.

The money has nothing to do with it. The issue, we can't find officers.

Okay, so it's personnel. Nobody wants to be a police officer.

Nobody wants to be a police officer.

Nobody wants to do it.

Okay, well.

The budgeted amount for the police is them at a full staff capacity. So, yeah, that is part of the disconnect there is it is not fully staffed.

Okay. Is the... I don't know what jurisdiction it falls under, but say, like, the guy that follows the street sweeper, the hands-out tickets, could he or they be utilized... for calls such as last night you have to be act 120 certified okay all right yeah there's liability involved and a whole lot of messable liabilities okay because i know he writes tickets for parking enforcement yeah they could be utilized for that okay all right well if they are not currently maybe perhaps something that we could look into i mean it's mickey mouse when you're talking murders and shootings and domestic disputes. I understand that. But if you want residents to respect the laws of this municipality, we've got to teach them, counsel them to have some respect because respect just isn't given. It's earned. before it's forced on whichever. That's all I have to say.

I do know we've been, you know, and Holly's been deciding, a lot of our guys aren't working a lot of overtime. But at the end of the day, they need time off too to recuperate too. Absolutely. So if anybody has a magic pill where we can hire six ACT 120 trained officers ready to go off the streets right now, we'll take suggestions. Okay.

All right. I'm just questioning because it's a balancing act and even with the inability to hire people maybe that's a discussion for another day thank you I don't have a topic I just want to know

what happened with the motion that ethan i i couldn't understand who said no who said yes i'm sorry okay so it is changed then on the agenda okay i just didn't follow that at all thank you yeah i had a question on that too uh could you elaborate on that motion what that was about

yeah so when we get to it i'm going to read out the full ordinance um to make sure everybody's on the same page about what is being discussed but we're going to get to that when we get to it as a new item or new business okay was the motion to put that on the agenda or you actually made a motion to put that on the agenda okay so it's not going on yeah it will be discussed during new business tonight okay thank you

anybody else thank you um next we have minutes for approval consider approval by the borough council meeting minutes for june 23rd 2026. so move i'll make a motion to approve i'll second the motion i have a motion by councilman buyer second by councilman cooper to approved the public council meeting minutes for june 23rd 2026. any questions all in favor say aye aye aye mayor looks is out of town today

Wonderful. The Bible.

um

Thank you.

So I just have a few notable arrests, if I could talk about them. Absolutely. It's been an interesting couple of weeks here in our... The past two months. Yeah. So on July 1st, Officer Frank Ember observed a wanted suspect in connection with the Lancaster City police shooting on the Red Roots Transit bus. This is during the day he called it out, took the suspect into custody successfully and located a stolen firearm in possession. Those charges are pending, so one gun off the street with multiple. July 4th, Columbia Borough Police responded to a shooting at 4th and Cherry Street. Sergeant Snyder and Officer Nate Miller arrived within two minutes and rendered aid to the victim, who is now out of the hospital and doing well. As a result of that investigation, Sergeant Snyder filed a criminal attempt at homicide and several other felonies against Skylar Barr. On July 5th, Officer Ember was on patrol again and observed a wanted suspect in a vehicle. After conducting a traffic stop, the suspect fell on foot. Officer Ember successfully took Joshua Hussein into custody after he fought with Officer Ember for a few seconds. Officer Ember then located a bag that Hussein discarded. Inside the bag was multiple narcotics items related. Mr. Hussein was also wanted for firearms charges out of Columbia Borough. On July 7th, Officer Ember and Officer Krause observed Skyler Barr, who was, he was charged with attempted homicide. They observed him in Turkey Hill and Chestnut Street. He had an active warrant for attempted homicide. As they attempted to take Barr into custody, he fought with officers. They were able to successfully get him into custody without incident. And during the arrest, they located a loaded firearm in his book bag. So even though they are short-staffed, they got two guns off the street and have just been doing a phenomenal job. So I just wanted to bring that to everyone's attention. We are trying our best.

Action items. Authorized bill payments.

So moved.

Second. I have a motion by Councilman Byers, seconded by Councilman Ziegler, to approve bill payments. All in favor say aye. Motion to acknowledge and accept the June Market House report.

Do we really need to vote to accept it? Normally, that was just

Yeah, we'll just acknowledge the reports. Yeah, right. You're correct.

I was confused.

So?

In June, that was due for the August workshop, right? Yeah. She went on vacation.

Oh, okay.

Yeah, you're right.

Um, we acknowledge the June Market House report.

Motion to approve.

$575 will create Columbia CEBC CareerLink to host a job fair at the Columbia Market House. This is something we do, I believe, almost annually. Yeah, something we do as well. But we want to show that we're giving back $575 to the community. I get a motion.

So moved.

Second. I have a motion by Councilman Ziegler, second by Councilman Zink. to approve waiving the fee of $575,000 for Create Columbia, CEBC, and career-oriented hosted job fair at the Columbia Market House. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion to approve waiving the $35 fee for a pop-up event for CCAT to sell fundraising items on July 18th, 2026 at the Market House.

So moved.

Second. I have a motion by Councilman Ziegler, second by Councilman Fires to approve waiving the $35 fee for a pop-up event for CCAT to sell fundraising items on July 18th, 2026 at the Market House. All in favor say aye.

Really quickly, I want to say, on the application, it says date of pop-up, July 11th.

okay so okay because I'm just I don't know I believe it was July 11 okay and no I think it was July 11 right okay so we just need to because the amendment was or the agenda item was for July 18th right it's actually a July item okay just wanted to make sure so you still okay with that yeah I have a motion by councilman Ziegler second by councilman Byers to approve waiving the fee of 35 hours for a pop-up event CCAT fundraising at the Market House on July 11, 2026. All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Thank you.

Motion to approve waiving a $35 fee for a pop-up event for St. Paul's Episcopal Church to sell tickets to assist in roof repair at the Market House.

So moved.

Second.

Second.

And then everybody knows. We're letting all the non-profits.

Any Columbia non-profit.

I mean, you can't do something for a church that you wouldn't do for others. And we're clearly doing for others in addition to the church.

Motion to approve waiving the 35-yard fee for a pop-up event for St. Paul's Episcopal Church to sell tickets at the Market House for roof repair. Motion by Councilman Byers, seconded by Councilman Goodman. All in favor say aye. Aye. Motion to approve the revised special event application for Raven Ridge Wildlife We already approved the application. They just changed the time.

So moved.

Second. Motion by Councilman Cooper, seconded by Councilman Byers to approve the revised special event application for Raven Ridge Wildlife. All in favor say aye. all right new business consider approval of resolution 2026-17 adding daniel kopp to the parks and recreation advisory board for a term of four years daniel cannot make it tonight he's tried to make it tonight

Okay, I'm sorry, my bad. Yeah, we're good. I just typed back in here. That's fine. Dale, tonight you did meet with the Parks and Rec Board and

approval for advisory board for the coming four years so a second i have a motion by councilman cooper second by councilman ziegler to approve Resolution 2026.17, adding Daniel Kopp to the Park and Recreation Advisory Board for a term of four years. All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Consider approval of application for payment number one for the $100,200 block of Walnut Street. So moved.

Second.

I have a motion by Councilman Murphy, seconded by Councilman Byers, to approve the application for payment number one for 100 to 200 block of Walker Street. All in favor say aye. Aye. Consider approval of application for payment number one for Union Street's TVVG project. So moved. Consider, I have a motion by Councilor Murphy, second by Councilor Devey to approve application for payment number one, Green Street CDBG project.

I just note the amount is $68,175. And I think, Jake, you want to comment on this? I think a lot of the concrete work is pretty much completed. Yeah.

Yeah.

All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Consider approval of change order number four, final for McInnis School of Mediation. So moved. Second. I have a motion by Councilman Murphy, second by Councilman Byers, for approval of the application for

change order number four final for McGinnis soil remediation by councilman Murphy second by councilman Black I have a question on that I don't see included on here if this is our final is there has there been any discussion about paying Iron Eagle ahead of time to do what's necessary to pull the NPVDS from it. That way we wouldn't have to do it after the fact. We could pay them and then it could be included in BIOS.

I think from our conversations that we had, thank you, Michael, comment as well that we are going to it's $500 a year so jake it does we're going to keep them we're going to keep it open we're not concerned with the potential liability um not what are you what are you saying we could pass it on to where purchases but um it's real time from their standpoint it won't be worth much no it's it's not it's not worth much because

there would be significant changes needed to be made to that permit. I'm just thinking about the liability for the borough of having the MPBUS permit remain open and, you know, if there's an issue with the filter side and we don't patch it and we get reported, that's an issue. You know what I mean? Those are the things that I was just thinking about.

I'll talk to Derek about that. He kind of read me in on all this stuff because he knew he wasn't going to be here tonight.

He had talked to me. He had called me the other day and was talking to me about it. He said that, you know, we could, if we thought we were going to prove a permit, we could did get an estimate from iron eagle on how much it would be to see what they need to pull off of there and to close out the employer yes permit we could pay them ahead of time they could come out when they can and take care of it you know to remove that risk i think that if should you decide to do that that could be

another change yeah i mean i will point out i think derek wanted me to point out that this final change order is for negative three hundred and eight thousand dollars so your your cost came in well below the 2.1 million that was paid so yeah yeah we did it it was like 1.8 so that was that was a good um yeah i

I'd like to talk to Derek as well if the conversation he had with you was different than what we had at the meeting we had with Public Works well that's fine I think he talked to me before he talked to the Public Works meeting so if that's what you guys had decided I just wanted to make sure that I understood

I have a motion by Councilman Murphy, seconded by Councilman Beyer, to approve change order number four, final from the Guinness Store of New York City. All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Consider awarding Milk Street outflow replacement to QV Construction Environmental.

Wait, I think you missed one.

Yes. Oh, yeah, I did. I went to 9. Sorry about that. Consider approval of application for payment number 9, final from the Guinness World Mediation. So moved. I have a motion by Councilman Byers, seconded by Councilman Murphy, to approve the application for payment number 9, final from the Guinness World Mediation. All in favor say aye. aye aye consider awarding mill street outflow replacement to kensington construction environmental so moved second this is the um is the cddb money as well

We have a balance to make. 85,328 remaining. And Bisley's bid was 65,775, well below that. And of course, the next lowest was 93,000. So it's quite different.

Any questions? I'm just glad that we're going to get that project on that's been needing to happen for a while.

The work has to be done by the end of September. So it's a tight timeline.

I have a motion by Councilman Murphy, second by Councilman Byers. Reward Mill Street outfall or basement to McKinsey Construction Environmental. All in favor say aye.

Aye.

Aye.

Consider approval of MOU with Lancaster City for water main installation.

I mean I saw the I read through the thing I know that they that they did to accept some funding I don't know what it's called but like a bridge funding to account for the increased costs that they were counting on. I have not, I did not see anything in this MOU related to gates or anything like that. So I have no idea when or what gates they're looking at. But the fact that we got to MOU that's basically spelling out what they're going to do, how they're going to do it. The only thing I didn't see in here, Kelly, did you guys talk about this?

We touched on it very briefly. The biggest thing Derek presented to the committee was that they are changing their courts, shall we say, at the corner of 4th and Mill. They will be tending to go through the back lot of the and that there was they had moved off their initial stance and they're looking at more curb to curb repayment rather than just to the password book so right yeah but I mean it's nothing as far as I've told you you can say that's fine yeah I mean the only thing I didn't see in there was any

statement saying they understood that if they moved into the northbound or moved into the to the eastbound lane that they would have to do curve to curve which is in our and which is what we had talked about with them originally was okay you're just going to do one travel lane and you need to understand if you go into that other lane you're doing curve to curve But yeah, I mean, it was pretty much everything that we had talked with them about. The only thing in there, Jared, the only thing, they don't have any specifics in there about with you guys, and there's no specifics about if they're going to leave things open at night, you know, putting down the the steel plates and all that kind of stuff so I can't answer that but as far as the this MOU is basically just addressing you know repaving and what they're going to do to make matters which I think is the point Is there anything else you need to know, Evan?

Right.

And yeah, and it basically is them acknowledging, because I do see they did reference our street degradation ordinance and all of those things. So they are aware of what our code involves.

Well, that was my first question, was how binding the MOU is. Because there was a lot of tension from the community about this project in the first place. they delayed it and then it seemed like just pop back up so that was my first question the second question I have is with how can they just go through private property not use the roadway they have the right of eminent domain

So they're a government entity, so we can't really stop them. They'll have to pay for that easement through the private property, but there's not a lot. We certainly, as a borough, couldn't tell them they can't run this line either.

I can understand that, but can you just assume that the VFW is aware?

Oh, yeah. They're aware out there.

They're negotiating.

Let's just say they're negotiating. Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

um and when we had our meeting they discussed that nothing would be left open overnight that the steel plates were just in case of emergency right while it was open during the daytime right and that it would be closed but there would be no open holes right overnight so yeah so like i said it's it's that's not addressed in the mou

but yeah the first thing I looked for Jared was I looked for timing and it's not in there and I've been trying to follow their meeting minutes and stuff do we know if they've also reached a understanding with West Hemfield since they're also going through it yes so they already have submitted for the project

I mean, looking back at the previous one we had, I think the biggest change that Heather pointed out, like Heather pointed out, between that one and this one, is obviously their new path they're looking at, number one. Also, their recognizing of our code, you know, what our code requires for street segregation, rather than just them just basically saying, this is what we're going to do. But, I don't know. They would need to be able to, I don't know,

You certainly could make a motion to approve this like

with the with the addition of you know that language about making sure that everything in front of the firehouse is closed up every night for instance that is you know missing that's very important obviously um but you know that's I'll leave that up to you if it's like I said this is an MOU this is very much kind of the first step that you know hey we're just we acknowledge that this project is is here it's going to happen here's some basic outlines of how it may go right it's not necessarily uh you know again illegally finding this is what you have to do right i know the timeline is actually the timeline's my bag it's not existent do we know if this is a project they're trying to complete before the winner i have absolutely no this is a i can't imagine it would, given the depth that they have to go to and the size of this pipe and the excavation that's going to take place, I imagine this is going to take a while to get all the permits and all the 811 stuff done and that kind of stuff.

No matter the amortization, this is a young project. I will make a motion to approve.

i'll second it like jake said we're never going to get exactly what we want but the fact that they made considerable uh movement favorable to the borough since their initial um mou presented to us i think you know and i think and for my i'm just trying to think back to our even our initial conversation i thought they always stayed from get-go they would always make sure that there would be plates placed over anything open at night to risk having someone falling in, whatever. I don't think that's going to be an issue. So I'll second that. All right.

So I have a motion by Councilman Zink, seconded by Councilman Murphy, to approve the MOU with Lancaster City for the water main installation. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Is there approval of application for payment number two to Delaware Environmental Construction Services, any amount of .

So moved. Second. This is the second, and according to the letter they sent to us, this is their second and their final payment application for the contract work they did.

This is an equitable contract. I have a motion by Councilor Murphy, seconded by Councilman Cooper, to approve the application for plan number two to Delaware Environmental Construction Services in the amount of $56,000. All in favor say aye. Aye. Better aye. First, before we get started with this discussion, Ethan did send an email out requesting to be added to the agenda. It was actually sent out to me personally for the July 7th meeting. I told him no. I wanted to fix the current ordinance that we were working on first. He resubmitted it again for this meeting and asked if it could be on this agenda. I said no. I want to wait. to fix the ordinance that we're working on for data centers we need to fix our data center ordinance before we can haphazardly move it from zone to zone the only property in columbia that the borough owns is for sale or not doing private sale the only zones that has a potential for data center is a property that we own and control. Any property, any other zone, there's other properties throughout Columbus. And the proposal you're recommending puts it in a property that's large enough for a data center, also is for sale. So I think we work, my judgment has always been, let's fix the ordinance first. If we want to move it once we fix the ordinance, that's fine.

I have no problem with that.

Tonya Meadows. Tonya Meadows, 2nd Street. With all due respect, we ask for the quorum that the speaker present himself to the mic and provide your name so we know who we're talking to.

yes so uh as you said i have presented this um to council uh this is something that

I'll read what I had originally said to all of you. So, I've been considering this change for the last few weeks, and as McGinnis' re-advertisement continues to be delayed and data centers have completely overtaken the conversation, I believe we should remove data centers from light business so we can focus on getting the property sold without all the baggage and considerations associated with data centers. i was further convinced when our solicitor evan brought up at the last meeting that an appeal could hold up selling the property for potentially years i believe it is in our best interest to move forward without data centers as an option initially i was hoping to discuss this at the workshop and then have 966 pass tonight with that above change However, with the workshop being canceled and pushing 966 to a future meeting, I believe we should not wait and instead get this simple zoning change in now so we can re-advertise McGinnis as soon as possible. That is... at its core why I'm bringing this up as a separate ordinance rather than including it in the entire package. When looking at the current draft iteration that we were gonna discuss at the workshop, I had numerous changes that I would want to see, which made me expect that it could be delayed again. And with the workshop being canceled, I could see that continuing to get pushed out. I mean, at this point, if we would have changed the zoning to conditional use, even if we kept it in the same place, we could have had a second round of bids with McGinnis almost over already. And this has already been holding us up for so long, not just in getting McGinnis sold, but it's overtaken pretty much every conversation that we have had as a council since then. And I want the strong regulations to be passed as well, but I also am aware that realistically we need to get McGinnis moving and we need to get this simple zoning change in so we can take data centers out of the conversation and just get it sold without the possibility of an appeal holding it up for a long period of time. So that is why I am requesting it to be added separately. I apologize for not having physical copies. I had emailed Jack to ask for physicals to be printed, but obviously he was not able to attend tonight.

The problem I have is, number one, we had said, I'm sorry that we missed the work session. That's where it should have been handled, through the work session, because number one, was no discussion or consultation with anyone else on council as to your your feelings on this i mean that's why we have work sessions to discuss these things out second of all we since we had to cancel the uh the work set work session we had said anything related to data centers would be off to a future meeting that has just been you can't as you have to be scheduled i get that okay however this that this ordinance you're proposing contains pertains directly to data center so it should help should have been elbow do we have that meeting in my opinion second of all we have committees on here for a reason everybody has every there's legislation we have safety we have personnel we have finance etc and we do have leads in there for a reason in 15 years of being on council that's the way it's been done it's always been respected uh to just go from this is what i think we should be done so here's an ordinance really jumps a big leap forward and i'm not in favor of that and nor do i appreciate the lack of uh decorum and at least have a discussion with the leads of the of the uh of the legislation

I understand that. I will say that I did speak to Tom and Jean, who are in charge of community development, who oversee zoning and planning. That's not legislative. I know. I did also speak to Heather on July 6th, telling her that this was a topic I wanted to discuss at the workshop. And additionally, I would just say that as a member of council, I am literally a legislator. And it is, from what I can tell, not very common for boroughs to just have a legislation committee. Instead, it is expected that all different leads of committees prepare their own legislation and bring it forward to the entire council. Now, that is my understanding. Obviously, you all have more experience than me. But Additionally, I would say that while I prepared this ordinance, I borrowed identical language that has previously been used by the borough before, and I spoke to Evan to make sure it was sound before I presented it to anybody because I wanted to cover my bases in this case. It is a very simple one-page ordinance. That is why I took it on myself to do it.

I wasn't really prepared to say anything tonight. I just wanted to see a borough council meeting that maybe was not chaotic. My name is Jenny Baer, B-A-I-R. I'd like to encourage the council not to write an ordinance that allows use for a data center. I additionally want to encourage the council not to sell the property at McGinnis my understanding is that it would be for about six million dollars if the borough is currently running at a one million dollar a year deficit it's only going to buy us six years what we heard at the really chaotic meeting in May was that people wanted a green space. They wanted to keep it the way it was and preserve something that's untouched right now. If the ordinances are written, that allows that. If the property is sold once it's sold, if those ordinances are in place, whoever buys it can pretty much do what they want with it.

people spoke last time and again you can't the whole purpose of writing of drafting a firmer ordinance is to put more controls in place we can't just say you're not building data centers in columbia period you can't do that it's totally not allowed by state law it will allow you have to allow it somewhere but it doesn't have to It doesn't have to be there, but it has to be somewhere. It has to be allowed in Columbia Borough.

It absolutely does.

Yes.

You cannot exclude a specific use from everywhere in the borough.

So you don't sell the property. And if you can write an ordinance to allow it, then you can.

well right now right now prior to an ordinance being adopted in the zoning ordinance because there is no use that defines a data center um it's technically at this point allowed everywhere in the borough by special exception because the ordinance would only allow the ordinance i'm proposing would only allow it in general industrial

To which McGinnis is not. McGinnis is light business. So it would not be able, there would not be able to be a data center in McGinnis.

So what areas are in general?

So a lot of it is on Columbia Avenue. For instance, the metal plant there, you have some by the river off of Second Street. They're kind of spread in different areas. But those would be the only areas where a data center would be allowed as opposed to now where it is allowed in general industrial and light business. So this would take McGinnis off the table as an option for a data center and leave one zoning area where it would be allowed. This is about as restrictive as we could be legally. We have to allow it to be somewhere, unfortunately.

If a property isn't sold, we don't have to allow it on that property, right?

So we were given a grant to develop this property for business use. If we don't sell the property, then all the money that we were given for this has to be paid back. The whole purpose was to generate, use the property to generate revenue to reduce the burden on taxpayers. If we do not get revenue generating business on the property, what we've been doing for the last four years makes no sense.

the reality. You know, people don't really want anything more. So that's what I heard at the rest meeting.

But I also hear, and I appreciate that, but I also hear we don't want our taxes raised, but yet we need more police officers. The money has to come from somewhere.

I have some ideas, but I won't share won't come from green space they are costs they are they are annual costs to the borough to maintain you know keep or they will not generate the income you think it will income no i don't think the green space will generate income only um uh peripherally when people come into the community and spend their money here while they're here to partake of the green space but at one point there were four code enforcement officers on you know on payroll so those are the ideas that I'm talking about

I just want to comment that a lot of people think that just because we're speaking one way about this means that we're not in favor of green space. That's not true at all. We have Columbia River Park. We have Columbia Crossing Building. We have Maple Park. We have Janssen Park. We have Logan Street Park. We have Rotary Park. many of which are unfortunately underutilized especially by our youth of this town for whatever reason we tried oh back in 17 or 18 when jim smith was uh one council on world leading the charge to regenerate and restart a a a program for a summer program for kids to come to the playgrounds like you and i did when we were kids first year we had seven kids sign up Second year, they had five. The third year, they had none. And all the flyers were distributed through the schools. I mean, I don't know what to do to get kids out anymore. So green spaces are great as long as they are being fully utilized.

excuse me so part of the concern with this mcginnis property is the the money uh why did we waive 645 dollars in fees that's not a rhetorical question i would like an answer i don't know what community is talking about at the and in the action items that we had earlier

So we will waive the fees for any nonprofit in Columbia who is using a borough location to put on an event. That's something that has happened for a very long time. Just any nonprofit that is based in Columbia will have those fees waived.

And the big one was the fee for the job fair. Yeah, but they're still a business. They're a nonprofit, but they're still a business. Do they not have a budget item for miscellaneous business fees. It's the Columbia EDC and I don't know what that is.

The Columbia Economic Development Corporation. I mean, they have a vested interest in helping us develop our workforce and other things. And I don't see that as a bad thing. a bad expenditure. I mean, we've got to do everything we can to support the groups that are supporting us.

And part of their support, I would assume, would be paying into the municipality that they already don't pay taxes for in the first place.

So a fee is... The Columbia EDC doesn't own property or anything else that would be tax free their members all contribute they're a non-profit but they're not taxed in the first place What would they be taxed on? They don't have property. They're just any other organization. I mean, their members are all business people that contribute their earned income tax to the borough. Those that don't live here are paying the...

52 what's that called yeah the global services tax um so to say that they're not contributing is not i did not say that they are not contributing i said i would think that they would like to continue supporting and contributing to the municipality that they are in by by paying the the gay rate rent this career link is a big

the county okay so they would have the money to pay 575 dollars career link does these all over the county and the reason they have them in different places especially columbia a lot of people columbia don't have the you know daycare to watch your children or for the time or the or transportation to get to the career link center that's in lancaster city so they you know they the reason career link runs these so they can try to get out to these different areas where there are issues.

I'm not having an issue with the fact that we're having a job fair. That's not the concern. My question was about the money and why we as a city borough chose to waive $645 if the concern with this McGinnis property is about money and we're going in a million dollar deficit every year. We're talking about money. I'm not talking about a job fair. So then I guess my next question would be, is there anything that stops us as a borough from renting the McGinnis property to different places while holding the land rights? No, there isn't. Okay.

We have made that decision.

You would have to start making payments on the loan if you were to rent the property to somebody. Either the rent or the sale.

And we have discussed that. back at nauseam when we were discussing the thing because originally part of it was we were going to keep it and rent it to the drone guys and when they pulled out it was decided we are we do not want to be landlords we you know are already have enough properties that we are landlords for and um get the land get it developable and get rid of it i understand that but if the grants are needing to be fulfilled by maybe have businesses there would renting the parcels of property not do that it would yes okay we would have to do a lot more work though because that would require us to put in the infrastructure that's what you were trying to avoid which is what we were trying to avoid so we would have to put in infrastructure which at this point would probably cost more than what we have left on buyers

to do on what i'm sorry on the bios loan grant so essentially the decision was just come down to use the grant money to fix it up for somebody else to put the infrastructure in place yeah okay thank you

I have a question on what Vice President Zink said. You said if we don't sell Madenas and generate business, we would have to pay back.

Well, yeah, I mean, the bios, the terms of the bios are there for, you know, the whole point of the bios program is business in our sights.

Right.

It's to take brownfield and make it

into you know to bring business into the community that's understood in the in the program but what i want to know is what's the time frame on that for selling it you have two years from the date we closed on the loan which i would have to look up specifically but you have to either begin repaying or um or or you know at that point two years after the closing on the loan which i believe probably november of last no it's it's september of 27th

I mean, it's no different than the RACB that we got for the market house. If we stop using that as a market house, we have to pay back the RACB.

But we didn't get that money yet, right? So we can't pay it back. You would still have to.

But we would still have to. We would not get any of that money because we would not be fulfilling the terms of the program.

Okay, thank you.

I'd like to make a motion to approve the ordinance to remove data centers from light business force. We can't approve or send it to yet about saying to approve to send to municipal and county planning commissions. That was the full statement. Consider approval of ordinance to remove data centers from light business for submission to municipal and county planning commissions.

I'll second that.

I have motion by Councilman Byers, second by Councilman Ziegler to submit ordinance.

It doesn't currently have a number.

It shouldn't have a number at this point.

Changing the zoning to the County Planning Commission. All in favor say aye. Aye.

Aye.

Rose? No.

No.

Jean, we didn't hear you.

I read it.

I saw it.

staff reports comments and announcements um just a couple of things this evening um you guys had asked to try to find a say an unbiased expert on data centers i've been looking around and tomorrow i have a phone call with a member of a team that penn state extension has put together to help local governments and businesses and people in the Commonwealth get some information regarding data centers. His name's Tom Brazniak, I believe is how you pronounce it. So I'm gonna talk to him and see if we can maybe get him here at some point or a member of that team to help us get some information that is, you know, that you can rely on and see if we can do that. So I wanted to let you know that that is in the works still. Also been working to finalize an agreement with the CEDC to bring that to you guys for 137, 147, 149 South Front Street, which is the fire, the old firehouse.

Can that be done?

can we do that already once we have we've been negotiating the terms back and forth you did a long time ago but it is it's yeah um so i'm hoping that we'll have that for your second meeting here in july um so that's kind of where we've been working so i just wanted to give you some updates on that as well engineer not here but a major

Not here. Boards, commissions, and committees. Upcoming meetings. Planning Commission, July 21st, 2026. Shady Chief Commission, July 27th, 2026. Minutes for approval. Minutes approved. LASA for May 28th, 2026. Borough Council comments.

um i guess it was last week um we had heard the citizens um comments in regards to the e-bikes and the scooters and such uh so uh council person buyers Kelly the mayor and the chief we sat down and we had a pretty long brainstorming session about that so we're still in the midst of discussing it but we're trying to use the statutes and laws and ordinances that we have now in place to find a better solution so we are discussing that Secondarily, Chief, if you can help me with this one. Lifeline is taking up an occupancy in the fire hall, I believe. Or, Jared, is that not the case? Oh, I'm sorry.

It's in the building. Okay, okay. Maybe I read that wrong.

So Lifeline is using a substation here. You said it was 7th Street. Okay, the 7th Street address.

No, I think they're putting it down there. Yeah. Okay.

But that but that is new as for lifeline. So they do have a substation for the paramedics.

Evan, if you're looking for some speakers this morning, I know I was on, and I think Heather was, and I'm not sure if others were on, but Pennsylvania Chamber of Business and Industry had a very, very informative panel session on discussion on, you know, separating fact from fiction, how modern data centers manage their water, energy, and community

available. I don't know. But the one presenter was from with two really good.

I'll try to find that information. More options rather than lessons.

We typically do record those though. So send me an email after you go to one and say that this wasn't through the SAP though. Oh, it wasn't.

I'm sure you will. And now that we have the elephant in the room supposedly on its way out of the room, now we can spend more time as a council working on the arc full of elephants that is going to be the 2027 budget and how we going to pay for it. That's all I have.

As Kelly mentioned, I know him and I attended the webinar this morning. on the data centers it was was very um it's very interesting to hear the different you know it here compared to this is the modern day marcella shale and you know how there was when that happened it was all water qualities going down air pollution's going up and blah blah blah in reality, our water quality has actually improved and there was no noticeable change in pollution. So, I mean, there was a lot of good information that came out and also a lot of good discussion on the modern day technologies and the way we can rely on our engineers to engineer the solutions and how, if we're putting in If the municipality is putting in the guardrails, it's up to the company to figure out how to conform to those codes. So, you know, our biggest tool is a strong ordinance. And along with that, yesterday I had County Planning Commission and I talked to another member of the commission, John Yoder, who is the West Donovan Township Manager. They are working on an ordinance. They modeled it after Penn Townships, which was written by Jozelle Cleary, who I have a lot of respect for. So I did receive copies of both of those ordinances today and also Peckwaite Townships. So we're going to be doing some side-by-sides, but just... eyeballing it and and briefly you know scanning down through ours is much more robust which you know like i told kelly i would expect it to be because we're an urban area and not a rural area like the townships um But yeah, so there's that. And as a fun, interesting side note, I actually learned what food processing residuals are yesterday. And I'm very glad that we in the program do not have to worry about food processing residuals. So, but if anyone is interested in guidance around food processing residuals, there is a nice paper that was put together by Longstreet County Planning Department, and it is on their website. so there's that um also the state legislator legislature did pass the ordinance that closed the loophole created by the pennsylvania supreme court about adding things to the agenda so we're back to what we have always known with adding things to the agenda it's not a free-for-all anymore so that loophole was closed and i think that and the state did pass the budget i'm sure everyone heard the state did pass the budget so all right that's it um this afternoon we received a special event permit

I was asked by our coordinators, who does the special events, if they needed a permit and can they get it done. This is a group, MJM Hoops from Fountainville. They want to do a park takeover of Mako Park. Unfortunately, they want to do it 6-15 or 7-15 individual. Yes. It's unsanctioned. It's not like raising money to do a thing or anything like that. But they wanted to give us notice. It's a five-on-five game, a two-on-two game, and a one-on-one game. There is a influencer, YouTube influencer that's going to be there. His name is not so Michael Jordan, I believe. um but we didn't have time to even review the application um it is uh just an event it's so different than 20 kids that the kids can never play basketball um so i don't know that we necessarily have to approve this but uh i wanted your thoughts and then we're okay with them doing it without approval i want She wanted to be aware of it.

Is that the one that you did approve, but you wouldn't wait to see? Because there was something like that they wanted to do. Who is the actual person? I know you said him, but is there a person?

Age measure.

I thought there was something they wanted to do over there. I'm not aware of it.

Their time frame is 4 to 9 o'clock.

no but it Jacob there is excessive trash and everything the next morning we need to know so that they can be contacted yes they should be

exactly i'm just concerned about any damage that we should find well they gave us all that information how are you going to prove hope we have enough camera evidence to prove what's what yes

I have no objections, but same concerns. I mean, I have those same concerns, but to me it's no different than a Saturday afternoon, a bunch of kids picking up playing basketball. That's what the parks are for. It's inspired for the youth, and apparently these YouTubers pay attention to the youth. So, I mean, I see nothing wrong with it.

But you should deal with it. if attendance like significantly exceeds their expectation of 50 like what is an attendance level in which it would be a problem i suppose i don't know we have any kind of fear it's an open area it's open air i just meant more of a concern of like a bunch of people like traffic anything that like we would have considered for like uh the clifford edmund tournaments um is like i'm Just not totally sure if there's anything to consider there.

But I don't know that we have that regulation, do we?

I guess, is there a time? Does he have a time on that paper?

It says 4 to 5 to 9 to 10.

I'm just worried about the bathroom situation over there. I just don't want anyone to get locked in there.

It won't get locked in. No.

I mean, I would say we could watch the cameras, but there are some issues with the cameras over there. Monitor the how many people are there i mean i i'd rather them reach out to us and say hey we're doing this yeah and also and honestly i know you call markel he's he does a lot for the community he drives around on the school bus he usually drives around yeah so i don't think i'd rather that than let's get notification yes so much people over there so yeah i want to pass that on that is all i have next meeting Oh, I thought you skipped him after Heather for comments.

I didn't have anything anyway, so I didn't bring it up. No, it's fine. I talked enough. I didn't.

I'm sorry, Jeannie. That's all right.

I'm not there. I just wanted to thank you for letting me be on the call. I don't have anything, but I'm going to go back to my vacation now. All right. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. All right.

that's my next meeting 7 p.m on tuesday july 28th 2026 council will hold a regular meeting i have a motion for the general second i have a motion by councilman easy second by councilman ziegler to adjourn tonight's meeting all favor say aye aye we've checked do we ever