SPRINGFIELD – The City Council gave first-step approval Monday to a proposed two-year moratorium on new pawn shops and junk dealers, saying it is important to keep the industry in check.

“I think the city is adequately served with the current number of pawn shops we have,” Councilor Thomas Ashe, chairman of the Public Safety Committee, said Tuesday. “This is the next logical step to address an industry we know is troubled.”

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