Odds and ends on a snowy Saturday

The weekend snow has been less than some of the forecast predictions but still has shut down many activities. The Rensselaer Library closed early and did not have their scheduled Train Day. The Library does have the 2018 tax forms available. The forms are different this year reflecting the tax changes made in 2017. The old 1040EZ and 1040A gone and everyone files a simplified 1040.

Postage rates are rising on January 27. The cost of a letter will rise from 50¢ to 55¢. You have only a few days to stock up on Forever stamps.

Fair Oaks Farm will open its new hotel in a few days. I have not seen an announcement of when they will open but the Fairfield website would accept reservations for February 1. 

Talbert Manufacturing was awarded a $320 million contract over the next five years to build semitrailers for the U.S. Department of Defense.

On Friday morning workers at Autumn Trace seemed to be installing the last few trusses. They had already installed many of the windows.

Also on Friday the Jasper County Finance Committee met. I had never been to one of these meetings so I went to see what they did. The Committee consists of the Commissioners and the County Treasurer and it must meet annually to approve the County's investment policy. Usually that meeting is very short and is the only time it meets during the year.

The Committee began by approving the minutes for both the 2018 and 2017 meetings. The County has quite a bit of money sitting in various accounts and the Treasurer has been investing that money in bank CDs. I recall at either a Commissioners or Council meeting a few years ago where there was a  discussion of what kinds of investment the State allow counties to make, and the State is quite restrictive in what it allows. Interest rates have risen in the past two years as the economy has expanded and the Federal Reserve has tightened monetary policy. The most recent investment that the Treasurer made was at 2.85%. The total amount of interest income that the County receives is starting to approach a million dollars a year.

The Treasurer invests so that each month a CD matures. Breaking the total investment in parts that are frequently maturing reduces or eliminates early withdrawal penalties if funds are suddenly or not so suddenly needed, which can happen when there are big expenditures such as the recent energy upgrades at the Court House. At Friday's meeting a representative from the Surveyor's office requested that some of their maintenance fund be invested so that the interest would go to the GDIF account. (I do not know what the GDIF account is but it funds some of the minor repairs that are done to ditches.) Currently the Surveyor's funds are invested as part of total monies and the interest goes to the County General Fund. The Board approved the request as part of the investment policy for 2019.

We are going to have a few days of real winter next week. More than the cold, I dislike the short days of winter. However, the days are getting longer by about a minute and forty seconds each day, and that increase per day is getting larger. I found a neat website that allows one to track the length of day for any location for the entire year. Check it out here. It shows that in one month there will be an extra hour and ten minutes of daylight.