Meetings 3-3-19

The March meeting of the Jasper County Commissioners had lots of small items with no big item dominating the agenda. It began with three buried cable requests. The only one I found interesting was one about a company putting optic cable in Rensselaer. A tiny bit of the project involved County roadways east of the quarry. I think this is the same project that I mentioned here.

Wheatfield Township received a grant a while back of $500,000 to help build a fire station. They have put the project to bid twice, but apparently found those bids too high so they solicited a third round of bids. No one submitted any bids for this round.

The Solar Power ordinance sent to the Commissioners by the Plan Commission was approved with no changes. There followed a discussion of the remodeling of the former PNC Bank building. Preliminary quotes were high enough so that the project must be bid competitively and it will be bid as an "as-built" project, a way to give more flexibility in remodeling the building. Councilman Andrew Andree, who is an experienced contractor, is doing much of the organizational work on this project. Before he left, he gave the Commissioners a map of the Military Operations Area (MOA) of Grissom Air Force Base. Commissioner Culp will meet with Air Force officials soon to hear what they have to say. Apparently they will show him a map but he cannot take a picture of it.

Beth Warren had three quotes for a new plat cabinet. The Commissioners approved going forward with one of the quotes. Mr Wakefield of Community Corrections wanted approval for submitting a grant proposal, which was granted. The Commissioners approved a few minor changes to the County Code where items were out of date or no longer in compliance with state law. There was a short discussion of a restrictive covenant that is in the County's title to the Jasper County Youth Center. The County would like the restriction on possible uses for the facility removed and apparently SJC is willing to agree. A variety of training and travel requests were approved. The Commissioners approved an agreement with an engineering firm to prepare for rebuilding one bridge and repairing another in Wheatfield Township. Overall the County's 126 bridges are in good shape, with the County rated third best in the State.

Karen Wilson from Emergency Management reported on two grants that her department had received. One was for $100,000 for radio equipment. However, she did not follow correct procedure in making the grant and the Commissioners were unhappy about that.

There was time for some public comments and several were made about the wind ordinance. There was a sizable crowd at the meeting that attended just in case the topic of wind came up.

The public session was then closed and the Commissioners went to executive session.

I stopped by the Recorder's office to ask about what kind of historical records they had. I was shown a room lined with books recording title transfers. Opening one from the 1880s, I found everything was hand written and some of the ink had faded so much that pages were almost unreadable.

In the evening the Rensselaer Park Board and Corporation met and both had quorums. After hearing Rick Odle suggest that they pay to get a plan for which species of trees to plant at Staddon Field, they reappointed Corporation members Musch and Pickering. They had two responses for the open Corporation member and appointed one. They then reappointed the officers from last year and approved minutes for the November Board meeting and the January Corporation  meeting. Because the February meeting did not have a quorum, there were no minutes to report but the discussions about soccer and softball that took place in February were summarized.

They discussed the latest set of plans for Brookside Park, which include three regulation sized ball fields. The three fields will allow the facility to attract tournaments. How much gets built and when depends on finances.

Heather Hall reported on plans for summer programs. In addition to keeping all or most of the programs from last year, 2019 will have a garden club for kids, a series of programs on birds and butterflies, health and fitness programs, a 70th birthday bash for the pool, and a summer solstice overnight camp-out. Something that may happen is cup-in-hand kickball, which is for adults. Players must hold a cup of beer at all times, which makes catching the ball a challenge. If you want to know more, search youtube for "cup in hand kickball".

In other news, CDC Resources, which has offices in Rensselaer and Monticello, has a new executive director. The Monticello paper wrote about her last week. See here.

The recent cold weather has frozen some slow-moving sections of the Iroquois River.