Two unsolved homicides 10 days apart have many in Columbia Borough asking why they happened in their small town and wondering when police might announce arrests.
Anthony Stoy-Velazquez died by a busy intersection near Route 30 after midnight on July 8, the 26-year-old restaurant cook having been stabbed once in the chest.
Then last Saturday, 17-year-old Wilfredo Garcia was shot to death in his own home on Plane Street, leaving his mother to recount the horror of holding him as his life slipped away.
“I think a lot of people are concerned,” said borough resident Ally Reitzel, a Columbia native. “I know people like my friends are not letting their children walk to and from sports practices any more.”
The Lancaster County Democrat who narrowly flipped a state Senate district last year rolled out an early TV ad on Tuesday, hoping to demonstrate determination to retain in the fall election what had been a longtime Republican seat.
James Malone’s initial advertising purchase is $500,000 for a six-week run on broadcast, streaming and cable TV, his campaign said.
The 30-second ad portrays Malone as a senator who “worked across party lines” to boost funding for law enforcement, greatly expand Sunday hunting and pass the Working Pennsylvanians Tax Credit. It also shows him with a fishing rod and target practicing with a shotgun, reflecting the district’s significant rural component.
Emergency crews responded to a vehicle accident near the intersection of North 5th Street and Avenue F in Columbia Borough Tuesday morning, according to Lancaster County-Wide Communications (LCWC911). The intersection is near the National Watch and Clock Museum and the School of Horology.
The crash, classified as a Class 2 vehicle accident, was reported at approximately 9:44 a.m. Units dispatched to the scene included Traffic 80, Engine 80, Assist 803, and MICU 77-61, per the LCWC911 live incident log. Three Columbia Borough police officers (including the chief) also responded.
A 17-year-old boy was shot and killed in his home in Columbia Borough Saturday night, the Lancaster County Coroner’s Office reported Monday.
Wilfredo Garcia was killed by a single gunshot wound to the head and neck, according to the coroner’s office. His death was ruled a homicide.
Coroner investigators were called to a home on the 900 block of Plane Street around 10:05 p.m. Saturday for a reported shooting. The investigators pronounced Garcia dead inside the home.
The Lancaster County District Attorney’s Office said investigators interviewed everyone who was inside the house when the shooting happened and there all occupants of the house at the time the shooting and based on the investigation so far, there does not appear to be a danger to the public and more information will bee released as warranted.
The DA’s office asks anyone with information regarding the shooting to call the Columbia Borough Police Department at 717-684-7735.
Garcia’s death is the seventh homicide in Lancaster County this year, and the second in Columbia in 10 days. Since 2000, the county has averaged about 12 homicides a year. The high mark was 2006, with 21.
Columbia Borough School District is set to benefit from a significant increase in state education funding for the 2026-27 school year, as part of a broader wave of new money flowing to Lancaster County’s 17 school districts following a landmark court ruling on education equity.
Lancaster County’s 17 districts will collectively receive $248 million for 2026-27, a $1.3 million increase over the prior year. This money covers general operating costs such as teacher salaries, benefits, and transportation.
The county’s districts will receive $55 million total, up from $54 million the year before, to help cover the cost of educating students with individualized education programs (IEPs).
The funding boosts trace back to a 2023 Commonwealth Court ruling that found Pennsylvania’s system for funding public schools was inequitable. In response, the General Assembly began directing more money to disadvantaged districts through the existing Ready to Learn Block Grant program — the funding stream that saw the sharpest year-over-year increase countywide.
Columbia Borough, one of the county’s smaller and historically underfunded districts, is a natural focus of that equity-driven effort. Districts like Columbia have long argued that state funding formulas failed to account for local economic conditions and the added costs of educating high-need student populations.
These funding increases arrived as part of Pennsylvania’s new state budget, which lawmakers adopted several weeks late without tapping emergency funds. The budget’s ripple effects are expected to extend beyond school funding, potentially shaping state races in Lancaster County this November.
For Columbia Borough, more state dollars are coming for basic operations, special education services, and equity-focused support, continuing a multi-year trend of the state directing additional resources toward historically disadvantaged districts in the wake of the 2023 court decision.
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Columbia Spy 