By Rebecca Feldhaus
Mayfield, KY – It will be about a month before the Mayfield Zoning Board will make a decision on the Somali Muslim application to use a downtown location as a prayer center. The board voted to strike the previous two votes from the record and vote again at the next meeting scheduled for November 9th. The board initially approved the application, and then in late August voted again and denied the application at a meeting that included public comment. Hopkinsville-based attorney Bill Deatherage represented the Somali's. He says it's the best outcome they could have hoped for.
"In terms of decisions, it looks like they've made a correct decision, a bad decision and then they've come back and made a correct decision to set everything aside and what we intend to do it to go forward with the application for the permit so that Mr. Ahmed can open the prayer center."
Deatherage commented on the initial approval of the permit and then reversed decision. City attorney Boyd Neely says the board decided on the new hearing because of the possibility a representative from the Somali group was not permitted in the first hearing due to capacity issues.