Tom Campione, director of legislative affairs for an organization called Pennsylvanians for Self Protections, spoke in front of borough council March 16 regarding unlawful firearms ordinances.

Campione, who spoke before council two months ago, said a letter was sent to council back Dec. 13, 2014 by the group's attorney regarding unlawful firearms ordinances. He said council told him it was dealt with recently, and it was left at that. Campione said he proceeded to get an updated copy of the current ordinance and noticed the matter was last addressed three years ago.

"It's obvious that no one from borough council took this matter seriously enough to have actually read our attorney's six page letter," Campione said.

He read the ordinance which says "it is unlawful for any person to carry onto or possess at any park a shotgun or field pistol or firearm of any make or kind unless specific permission is granted for a designated area for authority of the borough council." Campione said the borough has no such authority and such authority is reserved to the state.

"If there is some activity, some sincere effort on the part of the borough to deal with this particular ordinance, all is fine," Campione said. "Boroughs that dillydally and avoid it, well you can look to Harrisburg if you wish to see how harshly those are dealt with."

In regard to the last time Campione spoke in front of council, acting Council President Brian Holtzhafer said the previous time Campione spoke before council, council believed the ordinance was changed.

Councilman Brent Labenberg went on the defense and said he took offense to the comment this issue was not taken seriously and reiterated what Holzhafer said about council thinking the ordinance had been changed earlier.

Borough Manager Shane Pepe ended the discussion by telling council members to check their email regarding the matter, as he forwarded them an opinion from the borough solicitor.

"You have a legal opinion from your borough solicitor and I don't think you should discuss anymore with a man that is threatening litigation."

In other business, Resolution 2015-9, which is a resolution conditionally approving the preliminary land development plan for the Fields at Indian Creek, passed 6-0.

Borough Engineer Chad Peters attended the meeting to answer questions from council members. Holzhafer said they were moving forward with quite a few open ended issues. "There's not a sedimentation plan, we haven't determined how many units before the roads go in; this seems like there's a lot of concerns in here that haven't been addressed yet."

Peters explained all of these items are waiting on third-party approvals.

"We have substantial aspects of this project that are still lingering out there; theoretically they're all third-party approvals that typically can be packaged with this approval," Peters said. He explained the resolution has enough "meat and protection" to protect the borough through any changes or approvals that might occur through third parties.

Ordinance 1121, which deals with enforcing a graffiti law, had its second reading and passed with a 6-0 vote.

Ordinance 1122 also had its second reading and only passed with a 4-2 vote. Councilman Roy Anders and Labenberg opposed. This ordinance will establish resident permit parking on Iroquois Street between Macungie Avenue and North Seventh Street Circle.

Unanimously passed was the ambulance financial hardship billing policy. This policy, according to Holtzhafer, is "to make sure that individuals who apply for financial hardship have a system by which that hardship will be determined."

Resolution 2015-10 was passed which adopts an emergency operations plan.

The contract regarding the sale of the old Rodale building to Emmaus Borough Council was signed March 13 by the borough president.