Last post for September 2020

 The Rensselaer City Council met for its last September meeting on Monday evening. They began by approving the 2021 budget and then approved the electric tracker for the fourth quarter, which will be an increase of $8.75 per thousand kilowatt hours from the third quarter rate. They then discussed a return-to-work policy, which defines the procedure by which a City employee who has COVID or has tested positive for COVID returns to work. The employee will need a note from a medical provider. The policy will be in effect as long as either the State of Indiana or CDC maintains the state of emergency. The policy passed after brief discussion.

At the last meeting the Council opened bids for financing a new aerial truck for the Fire Department. At this meeting they approved accepting the bid of 1.625 for ten years. They also gave the Mayor authority to sign a purchase agreement for a new fire truck. There was some discussion about the purchase contract because the company seems to have sent two conflicting bits of information. It has given the City a 30 day quote but also has said that prices will increase after October 3.

The Council agreed to have a golf-cart ordinance prepared and will vote on it at its next meeting. The Police Chief wanted to spread the word that it is still illegal to operate a golf cart on City streets; no ordinance has been passed yet.

The City's project manager, Jerry Lockridge, was selected as the City Employee of the Year by the Readers' Choice poll that the Rensselaer Republican ran. He was given a certificate. Lockridge then asked the Council to approve a contract with First Group Engineering to work a Community Crossings Grant if the City is awarded a grant this year. The contract was approved.

George Cover noted that the City's insurance costs are lower this year than expected and moved to use the savings to increase employee compensation by an extra 1%, bumping the increase to 2%, His motion passed. Someone noted that the Cullen Street railroad crossing has been fixed.

The City is replacing the culvert over the Maxwell Ditch on Vine Street this week, so that part of Vine Street is closed. On Tuesday morning I stopped by and the old culvert was gone and a new culvert was waiting to be installed.

When I returned about two hours later, the new culvert was in place and the workers were starting to pour stone around the new culvert to fill the hole in the street.

On my way to the Council meeting, I noticed a bright rainbow but I could not get a good picture. During the meeting there was a brief shower and more rainbows. 

Fenwick Farms Brewing is raising funds to expand its brewing capacity. Currently it sells all the beer it brews at its restaurant. They plan a small building across the alley. Last week they hosted a question and answer event.

For more, check their website. The financing instrument is a revenue sharing deal.

A few leaves are starting the change color. I suspect more would be if there were ash trees left–they were among the earliest trees to change. A few that are still standing in Weston Cemetery are now being cut down. They have been killed by the ash borer.

The weather has turned cooler and harvest has begun.

Not much about Rensselaer

 On Tuesday morning there were a series of three meetings that were zoomed. The first was a continuation of the Commissioners' meeting. It began with a series of the nitty-gritty things that Commissioners do. They approved a cyber security agreement for voting that is State mandated. The bonds for the jail are being audited and they approved a contract for bond counsels. They approved an extension of vacation time for an employee and noted that Titan has begun work on renovating space for the Health Department in the former Youth Center. They approved the purchase of a mower for mowing the Court House lawn and, after reviewing the plans for expanding the office used by court reporters, approved a contract for the work by Titan for $19,740. They approved several purchases that should be reimbursable as COVID related, including a truck for the Health Department, a truck trailer, and a number of laptops. They ended the meeting with a brief discussion of a proposal by DeMotte to expand sewer and water services to the I-65/SR 10 interchange. 

The Commissioners then ended their meeting and reconvened as the Jasper County Water and Sewer District Board. I had no idea this group existed and it seems to be comprised of the Commissioners. They met for about an hour and the purpose of the meeting was to discuss DeMotte's plans to extend sewer and water to the Interstate 65 interchange. Technically the County has jurisdiction over sewer and water except where in towns and cities and where it has ceded that jurisdiction to operating utilities. The purpose of the meeting was to have the County cede jurisdiction to DeMotte for part of Keener Township outside of the DeMotte city limits.

The Jasper County Economic Development Organization believes that the interstate interchanges offer excellent locations for economic development and the development at the I 65/US 24 interchange east of Remington illustrates what is possible. However, except for that interchange, none of the others have a complete set of utilities. (The Rensselaer interchange has Rensselaer water, but the water main is too small to serve a new business that uses a lot of water.) Hence, the proposal by DeMotte would make the DeMotte interchange much more attractive to prospective businesses. As part of the plan proposed by DeMotte, a TIF district would be established with tax revenues that flow to the district being used to service the bonds that would be issued to finance the expansion of sewer and water. DeMotte would manage the financing.

There is some urgency in the matter because the new travel center being constructed west of the interchange would like to have DeMotte water and sewer. However, the Commissioners had a number of concerns. They wanted to make sure that there would be no unpleasant surprises for the County as a result of the project. There were a number of details that they wanted resolved before they voted on the matter, and the next meeting was set for October 5 at 10:00 (which means it should follow the scheduled Commissioners' meeting).

The third scheduled meeting was of the Jasper County Redevelopment Commission. It never got a quorum so there was no meeting, just discussion that mostly repeated what had been said at the Water and Sewer meeting for the people who had not been at that meeting. It will attempt to meet again on October 5. 

At least four County bodies will have to sign off on the project: The Commissioners, the County Council, the Water and Sewer District Board, and the Redevelopment Commission.

Other things

Saint Joseph's College has published its September newsletter. The most interesting bit for me was this:

"In recent months, individuals, businesses, elected officials and various members of the Saint Joseph's College Board of Trustees, have been approached by an outside group regarding the College’s future. This group, which is not associated with the College, communicated interest in working with us to rebuild the entire physical structure of the campus, bring back academic and certificate programming, and develop the athletic center into a community recreation center."

The six students who completed the Medical Assistant program took the test for certification and all passed.  The next group will begin in October.

The Core Building has had a new HVAC system installed and is the first building on campus removed from the boiler system.

The town of Remington is ready to begin a streetscape project partially funded by a $600,000 OCRA grant. 

In a meeting preparing for the Cemetery Walk, one of the guides pointed out a grave of her aunt who died of polio in 1946. She was a senior at Rensselaer High School, became ill, and was sent to St. Elizabeth's in Lafayette where she was put in an iron lung. There is still no cure for the disease once it is contracted. But what made this death really weird was on the same day in the same hospital a boy from Wolcott also died of polio and he is also buried in Weston Cemetery. What are the odds of something like that happening? For more information on the two, see here and here.

I do not think younger people realize how scary polio was before vaccines were developed in the 1950s. It not only killed, but it maimed and crippled some of those who suffered the disease. The March of Dimes was established to work for a cure. Once the vaccines were developed, its changed goal away from polio to improving health of mothers and babies.

The Cemetery Walk seems to be the only theatrical performance that was not canceled this year. Carnegie Players canceled, Fendig Summer Theater canceled. Did the high school have a play before everything shut down?

Some cornfields look ready for harvest.

Memories Alive was live

We are getting some late summer or early fall weather, with night-time temperatures recently dropping into the 30s. The equinox is Tuesday. My purple asters are not yet blooming, so there is still a bit of summer left.

The 3rd annual Memories Alive in Weston Cemetery had fewer people attending this year than last despite exceptionally nice weather and the addition of an alternative way of presenting the event. About 30 people attended the morning presentation that was held in the Hall Shelter in Brookside Park and roughly 90 people attended the afternoon presentation that involved a walk through part of the Cemetery.

Who was featured this year? One person was Faith Shedd Watson, the great niece of John Shedd who endowed the Shedd aquarium in Chicago. Faith was in her thirties when she married widower Henry Watson, who was in his seventies. A year or two later they had a daughter.

John Hudson was killed in Germany in the waning days of World War II. John Alter wrote a historical novel about life in the early days of Jasper and Newton County. Nello Lunghi came to Rensselaer fairly late in life. As a young man he had several interactions with the young Benito Musslini and as an older man he managed the Rensselaer airport.

Before planning for this year's Walk began, I did not know who Ted Knorr was. He led a fascinating life. His mother died when he was five and he went to live with an uncle when his new stepmother did not want him around. When his uncle died, he became a hobo. He seemed to jump from job to job, living in Rensselaer, Florida, Lafayette, and Indianapolis as a adult. In the 1950s he organized the Rensselaer Speedway and it operated for twenty or thirty years.

Sarah Chilcote Sigler lived her married life in Mount Ayr where her husband was a banker. Who knew that Mount Ayr once had a very successful bank? I suspect Nellie Donegan Reynolds is the only person buried in Weston Cemetery who was born in Australia. In her day she and her husband were famous for their skating act that toured the world. Even excellent skaters need a gimmick to attract an audience and Nellie's was elaborate and expensive hats.

Moses Leopold was a local judge for several decades. I thought it might be hard to find good stories about him because past issues of the local newspapers are not digitized and searchable, but the researchers found enough for an interesting presentation. Moses played football for a very early Indiana University team even though he did not play in high school.

The program for this year is available here. (It is formatted to be ready for the printer, so pages may seem out of order.) Programs for the previous two years can be reached from this page.

The demolition of the building behind Fenwick Farms Brewing is complete. Below are three pictures showing changes since the last post.

The cement blocks and cones are protecting a natural gas pipe.

It looks ready for new construction.

More garbage news

The Rensselaer City Council met on Monday evening with a long agenda. It began by approving a request from St. Augustine's School to close a bit of Susan Street on October 3 for the annual Fall Frolic. It also had no objections to the use of streets for the October 3rd 5K to raise scholarship funds in memory of Jared Valentine.

Next was a public hearing for the 2021 budget at which no one spoke. The Council then considered three rate ordinances, a follow-up of the last meeting in July.

The Trash-Sanitation Department ordinance will do away with the stickers and set rates at $17.85 a month in 2021, $18.45 a month in 2022, and $19.00 a month in 2023. These will be billed on the monthly utility bill. The Sewer Rate Ordinance will increase rates by 8% in 2021, another 8% in 2022, and a further 6% in 2023. The Water Utility rate will increase by a total of 13% in increments of 6%, 4%, and 3% over three years. The ordinances are of the type that need to be approved in two separate meetings to take effect. The Council voted to approve them all at this first reading. The Council will vote again, probably at the first meeting in October, at which time there will also be a public hearing. (Might be an interesting meeting.) The reason for the delay until October is that the public hearing must be properly advertised.

The meeting then took up more routine matters. An amendment to the 2021 Salary Ordinance was approved that establishes rewards for 40 years of City employment, a bonus of $400 and a jacket with a City of Rensselaer emblem. The gas tracker for September will be an increase of 3.85¢ per hundred cubic feet. Four bids were opened for financing the purchase of a new aerial truck for the Fire Department. They ranged from 1.379% for seven years to 3.172% for ten years. The bids were given to a committee to evaluate. The 2021 health insurance policy for City employees will be a 18.7% decrease.

The City Gas Department received permission to replace its 2005 service truck that has more than 150,000 miles. It may take a year from ordering to delivery. The committee recently established to advise the Council on a golf-cart ordinance punted and brought the matter back to the Council without a recommendation. Many area towns have a golf-cart ordinance and they usually have a variety of restrictions of when, where, and who. Arguments for cited convenience and increased socializing by citizens and arguments against mentioned safety concerns. The matter was tabled until the next meeting so Council members could do further research.

There were two requests for public-relations funds, both approved. One was from the American Legion for their 32nd Annual Thanksgiving dinner which this year will be carry-out only. The other was for a retirement party for Claude Grow, who is superintendent of the power plant.

The Council approved trick & treating hours of 5:00 to 7:00 on Halloween. If people do not want to participate, they should keep their porch light off.

George Cover again expressed concern about the rail crossing on Cullen. I took a look at it and it has never been finished. Apparently there is a 800 number on the crossing to call if there are problems, but I forgot to look for it.

The Fire Department's aerial truck will be going to southern Illinois where a company will see if they can fix it. Before it adjourned, the Council approved spending $14,500 to remove 16 dead or dying ash trees in Weston Cemetery. They are all along the Maxwell Ditch.

As I was leaving, I heard a conversation in the hallway mention that the building in the alley behind Fenwick Farms Brewing would be demolished on Tuesday. About noon on Tuesday I stopped by to see what was happening.

In the evening I stopped by again to see how much they had finished in a day.

I noticed a flower painted on the wall of the other alley building.

On Tuesday evening the Jasper County Council had its September meeting. The first order of business was approving the 2021 budget. Before reading a long list of numbers, Rein Bontreger noted that there was no room in the budget this year to give County employees raises. The budget is about $100,000 less than last year and the Council expects a couple of tight years ahead, in part because state income taxes will be down this year. (What the State gives to the County is delayed, so taxes collected this year affect future spending.) At the end of the meeting, it was noted that the County's assessed valuation decreased and the property tax rate increased.

After approving the budget, the Council listened to presentations for four non-binding reviews. The first was the Rensselaer School Corporation, which has to present its budget to the Council because it has an appointed Board. The Corporation has been cutting staff because enrollment has been decreasing, something common in rural counties. However, there have been some staff added this year to handle on-line students. The Corporation's budget includes $2.07 million for debt service, which is down a bit from last year. Superintendent Craig mentioned the newly-paved parking lot and a change in traffic patterns to make the flow of vehicles smoother when school lets out. In response to a question, he said that fewer students are riding buses this year. The School Board has raised pay for substitute teachers, from $52 a day to $75 a day for those without a teaching license and from $88 to $100 for those with a license.

Next up was the Airport budget. The Airport is doing a master plan for the next 20-25 years. Fuel sales have increased this year compared to last year, and last year had the highest fuel sales ever. The Airport is postponing a new hangar project and as a result there is a reduction of $335,000 in its cumulative building fund. All bays in the two newest hangars are leased. There are a few vacancies in the WWII-era hangar but that is because some of the bays that have problems that are not economical to fix.

Next were brief presentations from the Northwest Indiana Solid Waste District and the Iroquois Conservancy. The Waste District serves six counties and is completely funded by fees from the landfills in White and Newton Counties. It has to present to the Jasper County Council because Jasper County has the largest assessed valuation of the six counties it serves. It was suggested that after NIPSCO closes its Wheatfield plant, White County may surpass Jasper County. The Iroquois Conservancy mostly removes log jams in the Iroquois River in Jasper and Newton Counties. It uses drones to search the river for log jams, which often will move downstream with time.

With the review of these budgets completed, the Council considered three additional appropriations. Animal Control needed additional funds to pay part-time employees through the end of the year. In the previous meeting the Council had granted part of a request and told Mr Sinclair to return for the rest, asking him to consider cutting hours. They pointed out that his budget for next year would require him to cut part-time pay, so eventually they passed an additional appropriation of only part of what he had requested, an amount that they hope will force him to adjust to what is in the budget for next year.

The Coroner's office requested $7500 additional in its autopsy line and $4916 in the line for pathologist expenses. There have more autopsies this year and the office had received notice from the auditor that the amount in the budgeted line was running very low. The Deputy Coroner explained that they rarely spend the amount in the line for pathologists, and this year when the COVID crisis hit, their office had provided various related supplies to other County departments because they had quick access to them that other departments did not have. Much of those expenses will be reimbursed, but the funds will go back into the general fund. After discussing whether a transfer rather than an additional appropriation would work, the Council approved the additional $7500, did not allow the $4916, and instructed the Auditor to put whatever money was reimbursed by the Cares Act into the budget for pathologist expenses.

Next the Council approved an additional appropriation of $7570 for the Health Department. They were for expenses related to the retirement of the former health nurse.

The Veteran's Office requested a transfer of $1200 from transportation to furniture. The Council did not think it had enough information on the request and tabled it.

There was no update on audio and visual technology for the Commissioners' room. The County has received two reimbursements from FEMA for expenses of the Kankakee/Yellow River project, one for $116,509 and the other for $199,284.82. They will repay the bank loan made to pay the invoices for work done. 

About pigs and more

Another one bites the dust: The 2020 October Fest scheduled for September 26 has been canceled.

On Friday morning the Jasper County Roundtable had a session highlighted by a report of Belstra Millings LEAP program. About a year ago Belstra set up the Leading Education About Pigs (LEAP) Foundation. Its goal is to tell urban America the wonders of the pig. It will be offering scholarships to people in pig-specific careers as well as internships. It has also developed classroom material  aimed at third through sixth grade and can include an on-line presentation with someone who has been a guide at the Fair Oaks Farm Pig Adventure. Its first test will be this week at DeMotte Christian.

Before he talked about the LEAP program, Nick DeKryger talked a bit about Belstra Milling. They are headquartered in DeMotte and employ about 210 under the Belstra name. They produce enough feed for 100,000 dairy cows a day. Most of their feed sales are in the five-state area and they have about 50 dealers. To ship the feed, they can use their own transportation company that has 12 trucks. In addition to selling feed, Belstra has eight pig farm companies, all in our area, with about 18,000 sows.

The meeting was lightly attended, so the roundtable part was fairly short. Curtis Craig, Superintendent of Rensselaer schools, said that the schools had adapted to a new normal. About 12% of the students opted for remote learning, but some of them are now starting to come back to the classroom. Wearing masks does not seem to be an issue.

The Jasper County Library is still doing curbside pickup for those who want it. The Library is planning some activities that can take place outside.

Other things: The Little Cousin Jasper Festival was scheduled for this past weekend. If it had not been canceled, it would have had to deal with rain most of Saturday afternoon. This past weekend would normally have been the time for the Rensselaer Cross Country Invitational, which a year or two ago became a middle school only meet. This year it was canceled.

Fenwick Farms Brewing announced that the small building across the alley from their business will be demolished to make way for a new facility to house brewing equipment. It is next to the building with the mural and that has had its roof collapse. Fenwick purchased the building in August according to the Jasper County GIS site.

Grass has been seeded and has started growing on the Blacker Fields.

Last week when I took the picture above, a truck was dumping more stone for the parking lot.

All eight rows of the solar farm at the County Jail have had solar panels installed.

The Memories Alive in Weston Cemetery held its dress rehearsal on Sunday. It is an interesting program with a diverse set of people portrayed. Do you know which past Rensselaerian was famous for elaborate hats, often more elaborate than the green one in the picture below?

Tickets are limited in number because of the need to keep people distanced.

There are two performances this year, one in the morning at the Hall Shelter for those who do not want to walk and an afternoon performance that will have groups that walk through the Cemetery. Tickets are available at Browns Garden Shop, The Willow Switch, and Jordan Floral.

The event relies on sponsors to cover expenses not met by ticket sales.

Early September meetings

The commissioners met for their September meeting on Monday Tuesday morning, both via the Zoom platform and in person at the former Youth Center on Sparling Avenue. I attended in person but one of the Commissioners and several others attended via Zoom. They approved six sets of minutes: a joint session with the Council, their regular August meeting, the continued meeting on August 17, and three sets of minutes for executive sessions that were held with different providers.  They then approved a request from NIPSCO for use of County right-of-way for a natural gas line to 12 homes in Walker Township.

They rearranged their agenda to begin with the COVID-19 update. There were 23 new positive tests last week but no new deaths. The County has been granted access to funds that will, with the proper paperwork, reimburse expenditures that are Covid-related and the Commissioners were given a long list of proposed purchases that might be eligible, including laptop computers, pick-up trucks, a cooler/freezer for vaccines, a box truck, and hazard pay. There will be meetings with various County officials to narrow the list and see what can be justified. There is a lot of money available but a limited amount of time to spend it. No action was taken by the Commissioners.

A representative from the company providing County employees with health insurance gave the Commissioners three amendments to the health plan and the Commissioners approved them. A request for a speed limit sign on CR 1000N was added to the agenda for the October meeting, when it will be given a public hearing. A rezone request recommended by the Plan Commission was approved.

Judge Bailey, who was attending via Zoom, wants to expand the office of his Court reporters by knocking down the wall of an adjoining small storage room. The Commissioners approved the request, noting it might qualify as a COVID expense because the two people in the office cannot now socially distance. The
Sheriff came with several items to discuss. He was given permission to fill a vacancy of a corrections officer. He recommended ending the contract with Havel for servicing equipment and replacing them with Trane. Trane has replaced most of the Havel equipment with Trane equipment and the County has not been happy with the service it has received from Havel. The Commissioners agreed. A storm in August did about $6000 in damage to the jail but insurance should cover the cost. He had received a grant for about $5000 that will aid in funding the Spillman software and the Commissions approved accepting the grant. The Sheriff announced that the DeMotte Police Department will be coming on board with the Spillman software. They were a holdout but DeMotte may be able to fund the switch with COVID funding. Finally, he was given permission to seek funding to offset the cost of buying hybrid squad cars. Lake County has found that they cut fuel costs. He reported that panels were being installed in the solar array next to the jail.

The County Highway Department is preparing an ADA compliance statement and it was bumped to the next meeting. The Department also asked to replace an employee who retired last week. The Commissioners decided to wait until next month to decide.

Little Cousin Jasper received permission to use the Courthouse wall along the Washington Street sidewalk for a pumpkin carving contest for Halloween. There was a discussion with Stephen Eastridge about a bond counsel to aid redevelopment and economic expansion. DeMotte is considering expanding its water and sewer lines and would need to finance that. Mr Eastridge said that Smith Transport should be able to use the facility that they are constructing east of Remington by year end and that the Indiana Face Masks company may provide more jobs than initially forecast. The Tourism Commission met last week and approved a study on sports tourism and the possibility of a sports/recreation complex.

The Commissioners signed some agreements, approved some vacation plans, decided not to participate in something called the payroll deferral program, approved use of the Court House lawn for a RAMA prayer vigil on Oct. 17, and expanded the closure of the Court House to the public for another month. The polling places for the November election will be the same as they were for the primary election. Early voting will begin on October 6th, at the DeMotte Town Hall on Tuesdays and Thursdays and at the south end of the former prosecutor's office in Rensselaer Mondays through Fridays. October 5 is the deadline for registration and making changes. Absentee ballots will begin to be sent on September 14 and there are almost 1000 requests for absentee voting. The meeting was continued until September 22 at 8:30 if needed.

I did not Zoom for the drainage board meeting because I had another commitment, but there were three items on the agenda that looked interesting: drainage plans for Terborg Distributing addition, Solae LLC (Dupont) Office project, and Wonderland Tire addition.

In the evening the Rensselaer Park Board met. The main item of interest was that one of two groups that schedules tournaments had requested 11 weekends with two more possible for softball and baseball tournaments. The earliest would be in early April and the latest would be near the end of October. The tournaments would run from Friday through Sunday. The Board approved giving them the dates. Concessions will be done locally and provide a fund-raising opportunity for local groups.

There are still a few items that have to be finished at the fields, but they have been seeded so soon they should have grass.

A couple of exhibits

The Prairie Arts Council has a new show at the Fendig Gallery featuring art from Jasper County Art League Members. This is an annual show with a theme and this year the theme is "Reflections".

There are fewer works this year than in past years.

There are a number of mirrors among the art works, highlighting the reflections theme.

The inspiration for the painting below is Willow Slough.

You can see the reflection in the eye below, but what about the flower? It was created by the artist after reflection on the isolation during spring this year.

The picture below shows a lamp post in Wabash, the first city to install electric lights according to the note with the picture. Hanging from the lamp is a representation of an early electric-arc lamp, a reflection of the past.

The Gallery hours are noon to 4:00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The show runs until the end of September.

Another exhibit that has involved a lot of work and is not yet available to the public is an exhibit at the Jasper County Historical Museum featuring Jasper County authors. Unfortunately, the museum is currently closed because of the Covid virus. The organizer of the exhibit has so far found about 90 people who can be called authors. A few had books that sold into the millions (such as Edison Marshall and Eleanor Stackhouse Atkinson), but most have quite modest readership.

 There are dozens of posters with a picture of the author, a short biography, and other information. The exhibit also includes some of the books or articles that the authors wrote.

It is an interesting and impressive display and sometime in the future it will be available to the public.

How many Jasper County authors can you name?

If you get up before sunrise, you may have noticed Venus in the morning sky. It is extremely bright.

In important news, Franciscan Health Rensselaer is planning to close its AlternaCare unit at the beginning of October. Details are in the Saturday Rensselaer Republican.

Here are some additions to the post on the Wolcott murals. The artist of the mural on the Dye Lumber building is Janson Rapisarda who signs his work CERA. More on him here, here, and here. The artist of the woman is Nicole Salgar. More on her here and here. The Republican has more on the Wolcott murals.

Wolcott murals

Wolcott has long had a mural that faces the railroad track. It features the Wolcott House and is showing its age.

Last week and this week the town is adding two murals that are sponsored by Wolcott Main Street in partnership with the Tippecanoe Arts Federation. Wolcott saw what Rensselaer did and wanted to do something similar. The larger of the murals is on north side of the Dye Lumber.

 It is so long that it is hard to see in one photograph. Below are three pictures that break it up.

The artist for these is from near Chicago. I asked how he was selected and he said that Wolcott Main Street was shown the work of several artists and selected from them. He was given a list of things that the mural should reflect, things like rural and patriotic, and he submitted a sketch that they approved.

The other mural is on one of the buildings in the old downtown.

The artist is Nicole from Miami. She started last week and should be finished before Friday.

Wolcott is getting two splendid murals. I am impressed with the efforts of the local citizens to improve their town.

On the way back to Rensselaer I passed by the Smith Transport building that is under construction just to the east of Advance Auto. I did not feel it safe to stop and take a picture, but the building is huge.