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Business Owner Encourages Others To Stand Up For Ten Commandments

CONNELLSVILLE (KDKA) -- The Ten Commandments monument outside of the junior high school in Connellsville will remain there – at least for now.

Wednesday night, the school board voted unanimously to hold off on moving the monument and wait for litigation.

Earlier, students held a prayer rally at the site of the monument which has been covered with plywood.

Gary Colatch, a local business owner, wants the Ten Commandments to remain outside the school.

He and his kids have made Ten Commandments posters and displayed them at each of his 10 properties around the city.

"The only way they're really going to fight this is if our community gathers together and supports our school board and says, 'No, not this time, not here. We don't want you to cave. We don't want you to give in. We want you to fight,'" Colatch told KDKA-TV.

The monument was covered last month when the group Americans United for the Separation of Church and State sent the school district a letter on behalf an unidentified family asking that the monument be moved.

The district initially decided not to enter into a pricey legal battle, but now community members are urging the district to fight.

"Maybe this community deserves the right to stand up and say, 'No, we don't want to move it,'" Colatch said.

He is encouraging families in Connellsville to post the Ten Commandments in their yards.

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