by Dennis Dalman
editor@thenewsleaders.com
Despite three requests for a “Market Monday” sign to be installed on city-hall property, the Sartell City Council nixed the requests at its last meeting.
Joel Cherrico, a potter, and Terri Emmerich, who sells food items, both offer their wares regularly at the market, which meets Monday afternoons on the grounds of Sartell City Hall.
Emmerich and Cherrico addressed the council during its “Open Forum” session at its last meeting. Cherrico suggested the council allow a “Market Monday” sign to be placed under the city-hall sign along Pinecone Road just east of the city-hall building. The event, he said, is free, including several times during the winter months. The sign, Cherrico said, could include the market’s website, MarketMonday.org, so motorists would come to learn the Monday market is on city-hall grounds every Friday. Many people, he said, do not know that or tend to forget it.
“It (the market) adds a lot to the community without costing the city anything,” Cherrico said.
Emmerich said the market involves a lot of work. Vendors, she said, would appreciate it if the city would allow a permanent “Market” sign under the city’s sign.
Later, after Cherrico and Emmerich spoke, the sign request came up as part of the council’s agenda. Council member Amy Braig-Lindstrom started Market Monday four years ago, but she herself is not a vendor at the market nor does she have any monetary interest whatsoever in the operation. Thus, Sartell Administrator Mary Degiovanni noted Braig-Lindstrom’s participation in the discussion or any vote on the issue would not be a conflict of interest.
Mayor Joe Perske and council member Mary Jane Nicoll both said they are concerned about putting a Market Monday sign by the city’s sign will set a precedent for other groups and/or businesses who will want signs there too, leading perhaps to a kind of visual clutter.
Braig-Lindstrom said a Market Monday sign on the city-hall premises would serve to remind passersby the market is there every Monday. Such a reminder would be in addition to the temporary signs that go up along streets on the Mondays of the market.
After further discussion, the council decided not to allow the sign.
contributed photo
Various food items serve as an advertisement for Market Monday, the weekly farmers’ market in Sartell.
