With eyes flashing and voice raised, Blacksburg Mayor Ron Rordam quickly took back control of Town Council chambers Tuesday night after some audience members broke into applause during discussion of a new mixed use zoning district.

“We’re not going to have that tonight … thank you,” Rordam said to an overflow crowd in council chambers.

Audience members clapped and voiced support when Councilman Don Langrehr argued for changes to the ordinance, saying that, as written, it allowed too much retail and required too little residential, perhaps making developments in such districts “less than mixed.”

Rordam has in recent months had to call down the council audience during discussion of other controversial issues. In one incident, attendees briefly heckled Councilman Paul Lancaster before Rordam intervened.

Lancaster came in for some ribbing Tuesday night as well, this time from Montgomery County resident and local government gadfly Charlie Bowles, who accused Lancaster of “looking into the distance” while Bowles was speaking about the ordinance. “But I don’t care,” Bowles said.

Bowles spoke against another ordinance up for vote that would change the zoning of the 13-acre former Red Lion Inn property on Prices Fork Road from general commercial to the new mixed-use category.

Bowles warned that the Virginia Tech Foundation is gobbling up town land that should be on the real estate tax rolls and hurting other businesses by opening competing companies such as the Inn at Virginia Tech.

The Foundation owns the Red Lion Inn property and hopes to lease it to developer and former Hokie football star Bruce Smith for development. The mixed-use zoning ordinance allows more options for combining retail development with housing than do other commercial districts.

Confusion, and sometimes sarcasm, reigned when time came for council to vote on the mixed use zoning ordinance. Some council members were at times unsure of what ordinance they were voting on and whether a conflicting ordinance could also be voted upon.

Eventually, on a 4-3 vote, council passed a new mixed use zoning district that will limit retail stores to 80,000 square feet, but allow larger buildings with council approval. Council voted unanimously to change the zoning of the Red Lion Inn to mixed use.