July's commissioners meeting

The library is getting a new roof.

Or at least repairs.

I noticed the men working on the roof on my way to the monthly commissioner's meeting. It was a long meeting, lasting over three hours, but there was a lot on the agenda.

At each meeting the commissioners approve buried cable requests. On Monday they had two buried pipeline requests. The first was from the City of Renssealer, which wants to extend gas service in three places outside the city limits, on Eger Road, Wood Road, and Amsler Road. One of the dairy farms north (and east?) of town wants to put in three manure pipelines that will take the manure from the dairy to fields where it can be spread. Both requests were approved.

There was a discussion of insurance that was impossible to follow without the document that the commissioners had, and then they went on to fees for building inspection. This item has bounced around for months, and the idea is that the fee for larger buildings should be more than the fee for smaller buildings. It passed, with the exception of the fee for electrical upgrades, which did not pass because there was no one qualified to do those inspections.

The Sheriff reported on repairs, which is almost a monthly item. The commissioners heard again about he problems with the VAV boxes (which are some kind of supplemental heating unit that has never worked right, in part because they were not installed properly). The commissioners approved spending to fix the ones that have been identified as non-functional. The Sheriff also talked about dealing with FEMA in the county's effort to get reimbursed for expenses of the winter storms. He said the barriers to getting all the paper work done almost seem as if FEMA intended to discourage people from applying. However, it appears that his office will get $13,000 back and other departments also should get some funding.

A Commissioner asked about the status of the tower. The Sheriff said that they would be doing a test using the Midway tower. At present, the Sheriff's office sometimes has problems with radio communication in the extremities of the county. Finally, the Sheriff will be decommissioning a squad car, 2009 Crown Victoria, that the airport would like to acquire. However, since the airport is now under the airport authority, it no long falls under the jurisdiction of the commissioners, so they cannot simply approve a transfer. (The airport provides a courtesy car that people who fly in use to conduct business or shop--it is an important item for many out-of-town visitors to the airport. The current courtesy car is a 1998 model and it is becoming more expensive to maintain.)

Four representatives from NIPSCO were next to address the commissioners. At the last drainage board meeting, they commissioners had had questions about the long-term plans for for the fly-ash landfill at the Schahfer plant near Wheatfield. NIPSCO wants to do a phase six of their landfill and plans a phase 7. After that they will need new state permits.

Then there was a long discussion of the technical aspects of asphalt and the words "raveling" and "delamination" were used a lot. Eventually the commissioners decided to accept the bid from Milestone for resurfacing a section of 400 North and from Town and Country Paving for a shorter section that they referred to as the Sandpiper section.

After a short break, a citizen from the northern part of the county addressed the commissioners. He had bought a house that had serious problems and wondered why these problems had not been noticed by the building inspector.

There was long pondering as the commissioners decided which bridge the county should focus on repairing. None are in urgent need of repair, but some maintenance now to bridges that are showing wear can prevent bigger costs in the future. They finally decided on one. They also decided to spend some money to do maintenance on the exterior of the Court House, on caulking windows that needed it, limestone repair, and a bit of tuck pointing.

There were a lot of additional items, but the above seemed to me to be most important.