Marshall Closes Streets for Rotary Run; Halloween Request Gets No Motion

Marshall City Council | October 12, 2026

Article Summary: The Marshall City Council on Monday, Oct. 12, 2026, approved a Rotary request to close three downtown-area street segments for an Oct. 24 fundraiser, but took no action at all on a neighborhood’s request to close North 8th Street on Halloween — no council member made a motion, and the item died without a vote.

Street Closing Requests Key Points:

• The council approved closing N. 8th Street from Plum to Cypress, Cypress from N. 8th to N. 7th, and N. 7th from Cypress to Plum, from 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Oct. 24, for a Rotary fun run fundraiser.
• A separate request to close N. 8th Street from Plum to Mulberry on Saturday, Oct. 31, 2026, from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. received no motion and no second.
• The Halloween application, filed Sept. 29 on behalf of the “8th Street Neighborhood,” cited traffic-safety fears: “There are too many cars on the street. We are afraid someone will get hit.”
• The minutes record no stated reason for the council’s inaction.

MARSHALL — The Marshall City Council on Monday, Oct. 12, 2026, acted on two street-closing requests involving the same street and disposed of them in opposite ways — approving one and simply never taking up the other.

Both were on the posted agenda as numbered items. Item XII asked the council to “close North 8th Street from Plum to Mulberry October 31, 2026 from 5:00pm to 9:00pm.” The minutes record the outcome in a single sentence: “No motion was made to approve closure of N 8th St on October 31st.”

Under council procedure, an item that receives no motion is never debated and never voted. The minutes record no discussion, no objection, and no explanation from the chair or any member. Mayor John L. Hasten presided and all council members were present.

Item XIII, taken up immediately afterward, was approved. Alderman Jarod Green made the motion, seconded by Alderman Michael Smitley, to approve a street-closing request “from the Rotary of N 8th St from Plum to Cypress, Cypress from N 8th St to N 7th and N 7th from Cypress to Plum from 5pm to 8pm October 24th.” All council members voted in favor.

The application behind the approved closure, dated Oct. 7, 2026, is handwritten and identifies the organization only as “Rotary.” It describes the purpose as a Rotary fun run fundraiser. The form’s “Application Received By,” “Application Approved Date” and “Application Denial Date” lines are all blank on the copy in the packet.

The Halloween Request

The application that drew no motion was filed earlier and more completely. Dated 09/29/26 and submitted by Jen Crumrin under the organization name “8th Street Neighborhood,” it requested the closure of N. 8th St. from Plum to Mulberry on “Saturday, October 31, 2026 from 5pm to 9pm.”

In the space marked “Additional Information,” the applicant gave a safety rationale: “There are too many cars on the street. We are afraid someone will get hit.” The application adds that there have been close calls on the street in recent years.

The form carries a received-by notation dated 9/29/26. Its approval and denial date lines are blank, consistent with an application that was neither granted nor formally refused.

The City of Marshall’s Temporary Street Closing Application directs applicants to send the original signed form to the Office Manager at City Hall, 201 S. Michigan Ave., and states that emailed or faxed applications will not be accepted.

The two requests overlap on the ground. Both involve N. 8th Street, and both were submitted for evening hours on consecutive Saturdays in the same month. The record offers no basis for comparing how the council treated them; the minutes contain no discussion of either item beyond the motions themselves.

Source materials for this meeting consist of the agenda, the minutes and the agenda packet. No transcript or audio recording was available, so no direct quotation from the council floor is possible, and the reasons behind the council’s silence on the Oct. 31 request are not recoverable from the written record.