Lots of stuff

 The usual round of meetings on the first Monday of the month was pushed back to Tuesday because of the Labor Day holiday. The Commissioners met Tuesday morning with an unexciting agenda. They approved a buried cable request that will serve Omni Forge south of Remington and heard a resident request paving a three-mile stretch of a gravel road in Walker Township. They approved vacating one alley in Kniman. The issue had been presented at the June meeting and left unresolved.

The Health Department reported that Dr. Christopher Louck will replace Dr Nelson as its medical director beginning November 1. The Department received permission to replace a part-time nurse and received approval to apply for two State grants. (State auditors want all County grant applications to receive Commissioner approval.) The County is 42.1% vaccinated for Covid.

KIRPC received a grant that allows 6 of its 8 counties to develop a value-added agricultural strategy. The grant is an 18-month grant that began in May. The lady from KIRPC gave a presentation that the Commissioners followed with the help of a handout. The gist was that our rural counties are strong in agriculture and should try to leverage that strength for economic development. She referenced a Purdue website with lots of data broken down by county. (It is here.)

After the Commissioners gave the Surveyor's office permission to sell some surveying data, the Sheriff received permission to fill five vacancies: a correctional officer who had a baby, a retiring cook, a newly hired dispatcher who did not like the job, and two road deputies that were recent hires and also did not like the job. He then discussed the possibility of contracting out meal service at the jail. Of the 75 current inmates, 23 have special diets. He said that a company that is in the business of providing meals to inmates could reduce the jail's total costs of feeding prisoners. With the retirement of the cook, this may be a good time to make a switch. A formal proposal to make the switch may come at the October meeting. 

There was a brief discussion of a lightning strike that hit the Court House a week or two ago. It damaged some phones and copiers and there seems to be some difficulty in getting them replaced, perhaps because of supply-chain disruptions.

The Marion Township trustee is trying to establish an ambulance service but the surrounding townships do not seem interested in joining. The Commissioners passed two motions, one to move forward with planning for a central ambulance service and the second to advertise for bids for ambulance service.

On the topic of animal shelter repairs, the Commissioners approved spending to do the repairs originally planned and the repairs from the damage caused by a vehicle running into the building. Spending on expansion was put on hold because it would raise the total cost and at the high cost more State regulations would kick in. More than half of the total that was approved will be covered by an insurance settlement. The Animal Control Board needs a new law-enforcement officer to replace the member who resigned from the Rensselaer Police Department. 

When a legal notice must be published twice, a recently passed State law allows the second publication to be on the County website. The Commissioners approved the County to take advantage of this new law. The meeting was continued until September 21 at 8:15, if needed.

In the afternoon the Drainage Board met with a few minor items on the agenda that involved NIPSCO. There is not normally a meeting in October but this year there will be one after the Commissioners meeting to open bids.

I am short of pictures for this post. Below are two homeless people who were sitting outside the Sparling Annex during the Commissioners meeting. The wind was blowing and they came inside for the Drainage Board meeting. They were very quiet and not at all disruptive.

In the evening the Park Board met despite a storm that passed through. There was a discussion of ways to honor the late Bill Wornoff who was for some years the president of the Park Board and was the moving force behind the establishment of the dog park. He will probably be memorialized with a tree and plaque at the dog park.

There was a discussion of how to spend an anticipated donation that the donor wants spent on something permanent. There are still a couple events scheduled for the Blacker Fields. Overall the season went very well and the Park cleared about $15,000, mostly from concessions. Much bigger has been the impact on local businesses, especially the restaurants. The softball group that scheduled tournaments this year would like to do four in 2022 and the baseball group would like to do 8. There are also a couple of other organizations interested in scheduling tournaments. The hotel bookings for next year will be done through South Shore and the Park should get a cut of that revenue. (The revenue that the Park gets is used to fund Park programs and improvements.)

There are plans to relocate the tennis courts. A possible location is north of the soccer field. Some preliminary plans to develop the new Filson Park (site of the former Town Mall that burned a couple years ago) have been drawn up. They feature a small fountain in the middle, a shelter with restroom on the south, and a small stage along the alley. As when the City Council agreed to accept the land as a park, there was a concern of whether this land would be better used for economic development, but the Board agree to endorse the concept. It will now go to the City Council for their endorsement. (The development of the Park will be financed by the family that donated the land.)

As the meeting drew to a close, there was a discussion of vandalism in the parks. During that discussion someone mentioned that sometime this summer Lady Godiva came to Brookside Park and other parts of Rensselaer riding a bicycle instead of a horse. Apparently her ride was witnessed by a number of people, including members of one the school sports teams. 

Update: I had intended to attend the Airport Authority Board meeting via Zoom on Thursday evening but got distracted and forgot to log in. I wanted to know if the person offered the airport manager had accepted. To find out I e-mailed someone who was at the meeting and was told that the first choice had declined. The search committee did another interview and made a second recommendation that was approved at the meeting.