Allendale Town, County Hold Joint Retreat to Address Infrastructure and Property Issues

The Town of Allendale and Allendale County convened a joint working retreat Saturday at the 1919 Thurmond Mall in Columbia, with Mayor Pro Tempore Kathy Tharin presiding over an agenda that put four persistent local challenges squarely in front of leadership from both governments at once: Memorial Avenue, mosquito control, capital property sales, and the unresolved future of the old Department of Social Services building.

The March 28 session was deliberately structured as a retreat rather than a formal council meeting, a format that allows officials to work through overlapping responsibilities without the procedural constraints of a standard public hearing. The decision to convene in Columbia reinforced the intent: a dedicated strategic day removed from Allendale's routine municipal calendar rather than a brief after-hours session at a local government office.

Four agenda items drove the day's work. A county update on Memorial Avenue placed one of the area's notable roadways under joint scrutiny, with maintenance costs, right-of-way questions, or capital funding alignment among the likely issues in play. The joint mosquito agenda item acknowledged what residents already know each spring: pest control carries both public health and quality-of-life consequences, and addressing it effectively requires town and county to move together rather than in parallel.

Capital sales project items signaled active efforts to assess or transfer surplus county assets, decisions with direct consequences for the county budget and any development interest that follows. The old DSS building may carry the most visible stakes of the four. That county-owned property, formerly home to social services, now faces a determination on whether it is renovated, repurposed, sold, or demolished. In a small county with limited commercial real estate options, the outcome matters beyond the balance sheet.

For a county where municipal and county staffing can be stretched thin, the retreat format is itself a practical resource: shared sessions reduce duplicate planning, align grant applications, and prevent cross-jurisdictional issues from stalling through bureaucratic inertia. Formal decisions stemming from the retreat are expected to surface in subsequent meeting agendas and public notices from both governments in the coming weeks.