A lot of pictures

Below is a picture of all that remains of the angry birds mural that was painted this past summer.

 The heat from the fire that destroyed the Town Mall warped the side of the sign that faced the fire.

 On Tuesday the Remington fire department sent their aerial truck to extinguish a flare up of the fire. The excavator was busy digging in the debris at the same time. Rensselaer's aerial truck is out of service because the ladder does not function properly.

Fencing has been erected around the entire half block to keep people away from the demolition that is starting to take place.

Several former tenants of the Town Mall have found temporary places from which to conduct business. The Cutting Room will work out of the Renew Salon, Express Employment said that they would be at Healthy Haven (updated to Embers Venue). Work One refers people to their Morocco office. If you know of other arrangements, write something in the comments to the blog.

It is sad to see the sign below. The new bakery seemed to be off to a strong start.

 County Bumpkin has a very attractive sign in its window.

 I visited the bridge on Saturday and the approach still had not been paved. On Tuesday there was new asphalt and a machine was cutting grooves into the surface.

 It is good to have groovy bridges.

I am not sure what else needs to be done. It looks about ready to open.

On Tuesday I got a chance to see what was happening inside the old PNC building. The open lobby has been closed in with walls. The main part of the prosecutor's office will be behind the wall on the right.

Below is a peek through the door. Along the far wall are the offices that were in the bank. They remain.

Where once bank tellers waited on customers are several small offices behind a new wall. The far office will be for emergency management and the others will be for people working on child support issues.

 Here is a look into two of the small offices.

 Do you remember what the balusters of the old stairs looked like? The new ones are much closer together. The door is for the elevator and if you look carefully you might see some of the elevator mechanism.

 The basement has lots of small rooms. It will house the probation department. The view below is not showing the staircase of the previous photo but the one on the other side of the building.

 I noticed that there was what looked like an old patch to the concrete that had been signed by some of the bank workers. I suspect it has hidden under carpet for years and that it will soon be hiding under carpet again.

 The finishing date is uncertain. The building still needs to have computer networking installed and no date has been set for that. (Not the County's fault.)

Both the Jasper County BZA and Plan Commission met on Monday night. The BZA meeting lasted five minutes and approved continuing a variance for a person who had his mother-in-law living in a trailer on his property. The variance has to be renewed every two years. The Plan Commission was scheduled to meet at 7:10 and had to wait for five minutes to begin its meeting. Its meeting approved a three-lot subdivision in Kankakee Township. A variance for this property had been granted at last month's BZA meeting. The Plan Commission meeting last ten minutes. If there is an agenda for either group, the meeting will be December 16. The third Monday in January is the M.L. King holiday, so the January meeting, if there is one, will be the 27th.

Strack and VanTil has their Christmas trees on display.