From the Mayor - Thurmont

Mayor John Kinnaird Thurmont has survived yet another Colorfest weekend, probably the best one we have seen weather-wise and crowd-wise in the past five years or so. Saturday was an amazing day, despite starting out cloudy, and Sunday was just as nice. First and foremost, I want to thank our residents for making this a great weekend; your patience and understanding go a long way to making this event work for all of us. As you may know, many of our local non-profits count on Colorfest as their biggest fundraiser of the year. I want to thank all the vendors and Catoctin Colorfest, Inc. for coming out this year and helping to make the weekend a success. Thanks, also, to our town staff, both our office workers and the outdoor crews. The office staff had been working for several weeks making sure everything was planned and that vendors were able to get their permits. Our outdoor crew worked all weekend making sure that things ran smoothly. The Electric crew handled an emergency outage on Friday evening and got everything back in working order in no time. Our Police Department was also out in full force making sure there were no issues. I want to thank our department heads including CAO Jim Humerick, Chief Greg Eyler and Public Works Superintendent Butch West for helping make this weekend a pleasant experience for our guests and vendors. I want to mention that we had three amazing companies helping us this weekend, Tim May Investigations and Security provided additional security personnel to help guide pedestrian traffic throughout the town in a very professional and courteous manner; Rill’s Bus Service supplied buses and drivers to help move our guests form the parking areas to Colorfest quickly and safely; and finally, Key Sanitation worked hard to provide our trash and sanitary facilities. Without these fine companies providing these services, Colorfest would not be the smooth-running operation that it is. Come Monday morning, our street crew had cleared away almost all remaining indications that anything had occurred over the weekend and things quickly returned to normal for another year. The leaves are starting to change colors, the daylight is getting shorter, and the temperatures are dropping as we head into the Fall. Be sure to keep an eye open for our children as they make their way to school. They may not always watch when crossing our streets, so be sure to be on the lookout for them. Remember that these cool mornings can mean the roads are slippery! Christmas in Thurmont will be here before we know it! This year, it will be held on Saturday, December 2, 2017. Be sure to watch for upcoming information about this annual event. As I write this article, we are preparing for the Thurmont Municipal Elections on October 31. There are three seats up for election: two commissioners and the mayor. I want everyone to know that it has been an absolute pleasure serving these past four years as mayor of the Town of Thurmont. I have decided to run for office again, and I will be honored to serve our great community for another term if I am re-elected. As always, I can be contacted by phone at 301-606-9458, by email at [email protected], or you can just stop me if you want to talk about an issue or concern in our community.