To Open or Not to Open

Just over a year after Swarthmore Borough Hall was closed to comply with Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf’s stay-at-home order, borough council members broached the possibility of partially reopening at their April 5 work session. Specifically, council discussed opening the borough office to the public and permitting events to be held in the Central Park amphitheater. Indoor meeting rooms would remain closed. 

Council members also talked about the ongoing closure of Swarthmore College’s Crum Woods. Last August, when students returned, the college closed the campus, including the woods, to community members. Borough council member Betsy Larsen has proposed sending college administrators a letter entreating them to allow access to the woods. “I’ve heard from residents that they are excited about the possibility of having access again,” she said.

Council will decide whether to open borough facilities, and whether to ask the college to re-open the woods to the community, at their legislative session on Monday, April 12. 

Online Communication

Following the murders of members of the Asian American and Pacific Islander community in Georgia on March 16, Swarthmore’s Human Relations Commission composed a statement condemning the violence — and hate crimes in general — and pledging support for members of the AAPI community. 

The commission then requested that council and the mayor adopt the statement and post it on social media. Given the urgency of speaking out about the violence in Georgia, the council opted to vote by email on this question rather than wait for the next borough council meeting to discuss it. Members voted unanimously to support the statement and to post it to the Swarthmore Borough Facebook page.

The decision to vote by email led members to discuss the council’s social media policy and to seek to clarify the rules regarding when members may communicate or vote by email rather than in a public meeting. Sunshine laws require transparency and disclosure in government, which means that borough council meetings, records, votes, and other official actions must be made available for public observation. Council president Mary Walk confirmed with borough solicitor Robert Scott that the email vote on the commission’s statement did not violate those laws because members weren’t discussing council business. 

Nevertheless, Larsen expressed concern about non-public communications among council members. “There are a lot of details that need to be worked out,” she said. But she emphasized that she was concerned about the process the council had used rather than the substance of the particular email that provoked it, saying, “We were all happy with the outcome.”

Council referred questions about email and social media to its General Government Committee. 

View this or any other Swarthmore Borough Council meeting.

The next council meeting is Monday, April 12, at 7:30 p.m. Details are on the borough’s website.