3 meetings and more

The Alcohol Beverage Board met on Tuesday and the Fenwick Farms Brewing Company was not on the agenda. Apparently some paper work did not reach the state in time, so they should be on the agenda in September. However, because they have a brewers license, they can serve beer so they can open on Monday, Aug 14. It is supposed to be a quiet opening with a big public grand opening at the end of September. What they cannot serve yet is wine. The hearing was to get local approval of a license that would allow wine.

The 14th will be a busy day. It will be the first day that the Morocco shuttle will operate. The schedule and prices are now available. (See here.) The price of a one-way trip is $8.00. It will be interesting to see if there is enough demand to make this a viable business. The other event starting on the 14th is a sale of surplus assets at Saint Joseph's College. Here is the link for more info.

Because I went to Fair Oaks Farms for their free admission day, I missed the Drainage Board meeting Monday afternoon. From the agenda, it looked like it was an unusually interesting meeting. I mentioned the Fair Oaks Farm Hotel project in the last post. Two items on the agenda were also presented at the Commissioners meeting; at the Commissioners meeting they got approval to use County right-of-ways and at the Drainage Board they explained how they avoided County ditches and tiles. One was a project to pipe the biogas from three dairies to a location where it would be upgraded and then injected into a natural gas pipeline. The other was for a fiber optic cable that would connect a tower on which Verizon is putting equipment to another tower and presumably the network. The last is a project mostly in Newton County and I think the tower in question is by the Burr Oak Mennonite Church.

Other things on the agenda were drainage plans for Infinity Fitness, a new office for Kaper's Building Material, Inc, and the Wealth Management addition for  Demotte State Bank.

A couple of notes of changes in Rensselaer. The building(s) next to Lafayette Bank and Trust (which were used as the bank when the present office was being remodeled) is having work done in it. I had heard that it was purchased but the GIS site does not show that. I do not know what the plans are.

The White House is getting a new coat of paint.

Birthright has moved to the corner of Grace and College (or is it Kannal and College) and now has a sign up so people will know that it is no longer the Impact office. The new Impact office at the north end of the Strack and Van Til building has not yet gotten its new signage.

Birthright moved its office on Saturday. A large turnout of volunteers got the move done in about two hours.

The work done by Insituform seems to be finished. They were lining a drainage tile that runs from the library to the new high rate treatment plant. It is a way of extending the life of an old tile.

Finally, the Park Board met on Monday evening. They showed plans for new ball fields at Brookside Park that will be the focus of a fundraising campaign starting very soon. There will be three ball fields west of the tennis courts in what is now an empty field. The JC Cruiser Shelter will remain and new parking will be added on the north. The Board then discussed a variety of small projects that they would like to get started.

1

Winter returns

The cold front passed through last night, and with it came some freezing rain and a little snow. Today (Friday) is cold and windy and the weather has caused numerous closings and cancelations. We may not see above freezing temperatures for the next week.

There was enough snow to cover the roads but not completely cover the grass. Below you can see what the College Avenue looked like in the late morning.

The wind was howling last night. I have not ventured out into the country to see what kind of drifting is taking place.

I meant to include a picture in the previous post showing work on the sewer lining that took place on Tuesday. The crew was working in the area of the library and when I passed by at 7:30 in the evening, they were still not finished.

The company doing the work is Insituform. The back of one of their trucks was open and it had a boiler in it, so my guess is that hot water is needed to install the liner. The purpose of the project, which began last summer, is to extend the life of the sewer. It is cheaper to reline than to replace.

Remainders

I meant to mention in my last post that some of the prices at the SJC sale have been reduced. Things that sit and do not sell can have the price cut. However, they are still charging the 10% buyer's fee that seems to have the sole purpose of confusing people.

It is not only cars and trucks that have detour routes established for the Washington Street bridge closing. There is also a detour route for pedestrians. It goes over the bowstring arch bridge. I guess the people in the picture below did not see the arrow.

 When the walker gets back to Washington Street, he or she is informed that the detour has ended.

 The bridge looked busy on Thursday.

The work on the actual demolition has not started. Instead the holes that have been dug are to a water main.

There are at least three pipes that hang under the bridge.

 In other construction activity, Insituform was back in town finishing the lining of a tile. They had done the stretch from the high rate treatment plant to the river earlier and were now finishing the power plant to high rate treatment plant span.

I was surprised to see a post on Facebook showing that something is happening in the old Doggers.

 The Jasper County GIS site shows that three transactions for this property took place on September 12. Party A sold to Party B, Party B sold to Party C, and Party C sold to Party D. The end result is that the building is now owned by RK Capital Investments LLC.

Before Doggers this place was Bubs BBQ, and before that the Dog House, and before that, a place that sold unfinished furniture.

Up the street, the building that was Landmark Realty sold in early August.

The City has a redesigned website.

The school busses run their routes before I am up and out in the morning. On Thursday they waited for me.

Fog delays do that.