Other meetings

In addition to the Commissioners meeting, discussed here, there were two other meetings on Monday. The Drainage Board met in the afternoon. The most interesting case was a proposed substation from NIPSCO. It would used for the proposed solar project and would be the first of several. The proposal indicates that plans for the solar field are moving forward and NIPSCO is involved.

Also on the agenda were Family Express at the US 24/I-65  interchange, Dollar General in Wheatfield, and Family Dollar in Wheatfield. I could not see the plans that were presented and do not know if any of these were new proposals.

The Rensselaer Park Board and Park Corporation met in the evening and the discussion ran all over the place. There was discussion of placing a post at the College Avenue entrance to the Monnett Park walking trail because at least one person has tried to drive a car on it. There was a long discussion about concessions at the new ballfields when there are tournaments. A company that does concessions for KV said that Rensselaer is too far south for them. The advantage of using a specialized company is that it would provide consistent service. There was strong feeling among the board members that local organizations and businesses be invited to submit proposals for running concessions for tournaments. The concessions might be excellent fundraisers.

On Monday a City crew was installing a light pole for one of the fields. In the picture below you can also see that many fence posts have also been installed.

Late next year there may be a tournament or two that will use the new facility as a soft opening to let the Rensselaer Park people get a feel for what will be required in 2021.

The Board approved purchasing frames for eight to ten new tables. They will be used in the new park shelter at the Monnett/Staddon park. That shelter got a roof over the weekend and on Tuesday workers were installing trim and a ceiling.

There were 21 entries in the Scarecrow Trail and next up is the Holiday Tree Trail that will be in Potawatomi Park. On December 7 there will be a tree lighting plus a visit from Santa. The Santa's House that has long been on the corner of the Courthouse Square will be in Potawatomi Park this year. There will be other attractions for the December 7th event.

There was some discussion of the dog park. It was noted that there are still people using the ball fields to exercise their dogs and not all of them clean up after their dogs. The Board decided that signs should go up declaring that dogs are not allowed on the ballfields and that at least one gate on each field be chained open to discourage people from letting their dogs run free.

There was also mention of the Patronicity Grant for which the Parks for People Campaign needs to collect $50,000 by December 29 to qualify for a matching $50,000. Additional pledges do not count but people paying off their pledges does count, so if you have made a pledge, consider paying some of it in the next seven or eight weeks. (If you are older than 70½ and are taking mandatory distributions from tax-deferred savings, there may be a way for you to reduce your taxes. If you make your charitable contributions from an IRA they count toward the mandatory distribution but are not included as income for tax purposes. So there is a substantial tax savings in making charitable contributions in this way.)

This was the last park board meeting of the year. The next meeting will be January 6.

On Tuesday workers were pouring the new surface on the SR 114 bridge over the Iroquois River.

In Rensselaer's municipal election Mayor Wood won in a tight contest with Scott Barton and Ernest Watson narrowly defeated Richard Comingore.