“Councilman Brennan and I have been in constant and productive discussions with the Five Points Merchants Association and though we all understand the importance of the St. Patrick’s Day Festival tradition to both commerce and culture to the City of Columbia—in the wake of the spread of the coronavirus that the World Health Organization today deemed a global pandemic, I am glad that we are of the collective opinion that we cannot move forward with the festival as planned and will proceed to postpone it to a later date when the public health threat has cleared," Benjamin told WIS.