The Mayor of the Mall

The Mall in Columbia is a community of its own in the center of Town Center. It encompasses almost a million and a half square feet of retail space making it the largest commercial property in HoCo. It has 202 stores and 7,200 parking spaces, and its own private police force. Since opening in 1971 it has undergone four renovations in 1981, 1999, 2001 and 2003.

Overseeing the daily operations of this retail behemoth is the diminutive Katie Essing. In the world of the Mall, Katie is the mayor and she appears to relish the role. The holiday season is high season for retailers and so it seemed appropriate for Paul and I to spend some time getting to know the malls mayor and get her take on the HoCo loco retail pulse.

We also spent a little time with Councilperson Courtney Watson getting her take on the ramifications of Greg Hamms recent departure from the Howard Hughes Corporation.

As we were wrapping up the show, David Thalheimer stopped by to say hello. David was a former candidate for HoCo School Board. Since we had already wrapped up the show we didn’t get a chance to chat with David on the air but it was still nice to finally talk to him one on one, outside of the political arena. We joked that maybe we should try to get Allen Dyer on one of our future shows. That could be interesting...stay tuned.

You can download the latest episode of “and then there’s that…” here.