Four meetings to end the month

 SJC Open House

On Saturday Saint Joseph's College had an open house intended to show prospective students the educational programs available on campus.  

The picture below shows the tables of the various programs. Closest is the CDL program. I asked if they did training for school bus drivers and was told that was a separate CDL certificate that they did not offer. 

Next to them was the Indiana Ag and Tech School, a charter school that meets at SJC on Wednesdays. They were unsure of how many students that they have this semester because their meeting on Wednesday was canceled due to weather, but it may be as many as 42. They had 32 enrolled last semester. Most of the almost 500 students enrolled in IATS are in the Indianapolis area and Rensselaer is a branch campus. It is a public charter school.

I talked a bit to the founder of IATS and Chairman of its Board. He is a writer who does not publish under his name. Rather he writes speeches for others and things like fundraising appeals. He said that the key to a good speech is to tell a story. (I am not sure how I can incorporate a more storied approach into this blog.) 

Further down the row and hard to see are tables for the veterinary certificate programs and the health-science programs. One of the draws for the health programs is that with a certificate one can work in the field while one pursues more education, such as becoming a registered nurse. 

Not in the picture and separated from the other tables was a table for WorkOne.  WorkOne provides financial aid to some of the people enrolled in the certificate programs, though I do not know what the criteria are for getting that aid.

I asked if the co-working program was still ongoing and was told it was. I also asked who was in charge overall and did not get an answer.

Rensselaer Plan Commission meeting

The Rensselaer Plan Commission met Monday evening before the City Council meeting. The Mayor swore in a new member, Scott Barton. The first two items of new business were about a 3.5 acre lot that was just inside the City's exclusion zone. The County had already approved the split of this lot from a larger lot, but the City needed to approve it because it was in the City's exclusion zone. They approved the split and also recommended to the Council that the zoning be changed from A1 to A2. The reason for the meeting was to consider a subdivision control amendment. The goal was to create a simpler process for small (1, 2, or 3 lot) subdivisions rather than have them go through the process for large subdivisions. The Commission created a committee to review the process consisting of Barton, Davis, and Sammons. The Commission then sent the matter to the Council with a favorable recommendation.

Before the meeting adjourned, member Stan Haines announced that he was resigning, saying he did not feel welcome. Perhaps this was due to something that happened at the previous meeting before I arrived.

The next meeting is scheduled for February 20 at 5:30. (Video of the meeting here.)

Rensselaer City Council meeting

The first item on the agenda of the City Council meeting was a public hearing for vacating a public right-of-way. At the west end of Vine Street there is a row of houses on the north side. North of those houses is an undeveloped alley. The owners of the lots immediately to the west of the Maxwell Ditch own both sides of that alley and there will likely never be a way to access that part of the alley from the east. By vacating the right-of-way the Council allowed them to connect the parcels they own.

Art in the Alley will take place on June 22 from 10:00 to 4:00 in Filson Park. The Council agreed to close Kellner Street for the event. The Council then heard a presentation from Reach Alert Systems about the emergency-alert system that they offer. The system can send messages via phone, text, and e-mail and can be customized in various ways to limit who gets which messages. It can be used for more than just emergency messages and the control will be with the City. The Council approved adopting the system.

The Council approved a proposal to have Peerless Midwest do maintenance on another water well. The cost is $26,368. Mayor Phillips then swore in Todd Wilson as Gas Department superintendent. An ordinance of fees for zoning and other building department matters was introduced. There was concern about how much some of the fees had risen. Mrs Weishaar commented that it is important to avoid doing things that will inhibit growth and development. 

The next two items on the agenda came from the Plan Commission meeting earlier in the evening. The Council approved the rezone from A1 to A2 and also the amendments that simplified the granting of small subdivisions. The Council approved a transfer of funds for the Park Department, needed for a later item on the agenda. Three conflict of interest forms from Council members were approved. A revised Ward Map was presented and Council members Armold and Weishaar were selected as a committee to review it.

The Park Department had sought quotes for replacing the roof on the pool house and recommended a proposal from Style Craft. The company wants a downpayment of 20%, which was approved. The amount of $23,700 was mentioned and I do not know if that was the total amount or just the down payment. Work will not begin for three months. Appleseed requested a donation of $100,000. There were concerns about the size of the ask and hopes that this would not become permanent. The donation was approved with Mr Armold voting against.

In comments at the end, the Mayor said that the State may require a wheel tax in order for local governments to continue receiving CCMG funding. The Fire Department had some electrical problems that fried equipment on the trucks. The meeting adjourned a few minutes after 7:00. (Video of the meeting here.)

Jasper County BZA and Plan Commission meetings

After the City Council meeting I hurried over to the Court house, arriving as the BZA meeting was finishing. I missed the election of officers but there was only one cause on the agenda, a special exception in Walker Township to allow adding onto a Post Frame Structure for living quarters for when their family is in town. It passed.

There was a surprisingly large crowd for the Plan Commission meeting that followed. There were two new members, Jacob Misch from the County Council replacing Steve Jordan, and Commissioner Ryan Hilton replacing James Walstra. The Commission elected Kent Korniak as President, Vince Urbano as Vice President (though he was not present), and Justin Rodibaugh as Secretary.

The first cause was for approval of a 6-lot subdivision in Walker Township on the east side of CR 200W north of CR 700N. The owners of a strip of land along the road live immediately to the south and would like to sell the north three lots and build on the south three lots, either for use by family or for rentals. The property was rezoned to R1 last year. Several neighbors spoke out with questions or objections. There was concern about drainage, some worrying it would lower the water table and others concerned because the land was swampy. The owners will need Drainage Board approval, so these objections were not the concern of the Plan Commission. The other major concern was renters and the possibility that having renters would lower property values. A couple of people liked the area because of its rural setting and did not want more neighbors. Despite the objections, the Commission approved the subdivision.

The other cause was a request for a rezone in Union Township from A1 to A2 to create a future building site. It was sent to the Commissioners with a favorable recommendation.

The next meeting will be on the fourth Monday of February because the third Monday is a holiday. The State Board of Accounts wants all attorneys working for Boards and Commissions to have a contract, so the Commission approved a contract for Mr Sammons.

Odds & ends

The legals in the January 23 edition of the Rensselaer Republican had an interesting notice titled "Legal Notice of Planned Improvement." The planned improvement is the demolition of the Wolcott Rest Areas on I-65. These rest areas were built in 1975 and the notice says that their parking areas are "undersized for current and predicted capacity demands." The five existing buildings and parking lots will be removed. Demolition will last from February until December. The estimated cost is $615,000.

The Jasper County Sheriff's Department is getting more than local news attention.

Jasper County will be getting a new historical marker, one for Charles Halleck. I believe it will be in DeMotte, where he was born.

A very cold week

County meetings

The County Commissioners had enough items to reconvene their January meeting on Monday morning. I had planned to attend in person because I wanted to see the Commissioners Room in the Court House again, but the new snow and the subzero temperatures changed my mind. I opted to attend via Zoom.

(As I put out my recycling in the morning, I noticed animal tracks in the new snow. A deer and its pet cat must have been by during the night.)

The first item on the agenda was signing the three ambulance contracts. This is done annually and now the size of the subsidies is based on the number of runs each of the services makes. Next the Commissioners made several more board appointments. It seemed that they appointed the whole Jasper County Health Board. They appointed a member to the Remington Plan Commission and four to Northwest Indiana Workforce Development.

The Highway Department has received funds from EDP for culverts in the Carpenter Wind Farm. The Commissioners approved the process for spending them, which will have the Council appropriate the funds and the Commissioners approve the claims. They also approved a financial commitment letter for work on roads as part of the CCMG grant. The project will cost more than $2 million and the County's share will be about $600,000. 

Earlier in December the Commissioners had approved getting quotes for a new railing for the Fase Center. Community Services had obtained a quote from Hamstra for $1750 and it was approved. The Recorder's Office makes documents available on-line via a private third party. That party is changing its software, going away from desktop applications to the Internet, and this new process requires a new agreement. The Commissioners approved having the Recorder entering into a new agreement.

Work has started on a new solar farm near Kniman in Walker Township and there was concern that some stop signs might be needed. The matter will probably need a public hearing. Citizens complained that no agenda for this meeting was published and a short discussion followed. There is no legal requirement for a published agenda for a continued meeting since all items fit under "other business" in the main meeting, but an agenda would be nice. 

The County will be upgrading a storage building at the Highway Department, but before they make the upgrades, some repairs are needed. The Commissioners approved $5108 to make those repairs. They also approved starting the process to get the old sidewalks on two sides of the Court House redone. Finally, they gave approval to the Fair Board to use the Commercial Building for Bingo, which is needed for the Fair Board to receive a State gaming permit. The meeting lasted an hour.

The County Council met on Tuesday evening with two pages of additional appropriations on the agenda. Most were small and seemed to be salary additions. I tried to join via Zoom using the url given on Facebook and also sent to me, but I kept getting asked for a meeting passcode. I did not see any passcode in the page with the url link, so I never joined the meeting.

It is always better to attend a meeting in person but when the weather is terrible, Zoom looks attractive. Next year all public meetings are supposed to be available on-line and because of my age I will probably attend most of the evening meetings during winter via computer. I hope that all the bugs are worked out by then.

Meeting of the Rensselaer Redevelopment Authority

The Rensselaer Redevelopment Authority, which is a different body than the Rensselaer Redevelopment Commission, met Thursday afternoon. It has only three members, and one of them, Jacob Ahler, was new. (He is not the attorney for the Authority. That is Todd Sammons.)

The Authority approved past minutes and elected Avery Douglas as president, Loren Berenda as Vice President, and Jacob Ahler as Secretary. The Authority issues the bonds that are attached to the TIF districts, and currently they have only one bond outstanding, one issued to finance the local fire department. Twice a year payments must be made on that bond, and the current payment was for $187,000, which the Authority approved. The bond will not be totally repaid until 2040. There was a question of whether the bond could be paid off early, and the answer was that if it were, the TIF district would lose some of its power. 

The members were given a report from Baker Tilly to review. The State Board of Accounts wants them to meet at least twice a year to approve the bond claims and they decided that the next meeting would probably be in June.

Odds and ends

The County has a new website and it may take me a while to find things on it. I wanted to find an old agenda and got a page asking me to log in. Also, the new pages are not visually attractive and hopefully that will change with time.

Going to the open house for the Harvest Christian Academy last Saturday, I stopped to take a picture of the other side of one of the semi trucks used for CDL training. (I had not realized that each side was different when I posted a picture here.)

This week's Rensselaer Republican has more details about the Harvest Christian Academy than I had in my post.

After the Redevelopment Authority meeting I visited the bowstring arch bridge to see how much ice was on the Iroquois River. Looking downstream toward College Avenue the River was completely frozen over.

But looking upstream toward the Washington Street Bridge there was open water, which was not surprising because there is a little rapids under the bridge.

I could not resist the temptation to take a picture from the bridge of the mural that the low winter sun was illuminating.

It has been a bitterly cold week but the highs for most days next week will be above zero.

Inauguration day 2025

 A ribbon cutting

On Friday morning Brick Built Real Estate Cafe and Coworking had its ribbon cutting. While I waited for more people to arrive, I took pictures of their menu.

In the picture below the owner of the cafe, Kylie Black, is holding the scissors to the right of Mayor Phillips. Next to her is the owner of the Brick Built Realty company, which is headquartered in the South Bend area.. Mrs Black began doing marketing for Brick Built several years ago and that eventually led her to becoming a realtor.

Below is a very short video of the ribbon being cut. (My camera adds these to the pictures I take.)

Rensselaer Plan Commission meeting

The Rensselaer Plan Commission met Thursday evening. It elected Kevin Armold as President, Stan Haines as Vice President, and Krystal Bassett as Secretary. After discussion, it approved the preliminary plat for the St. Joseph's Building & Trades Subdivision. The requirements for curbs and gutters along Sparling and Daugherty Roads were waived and a decision on sidewalks was deferred until phase Four. The approval was contingent on completion of a few minor changes. The assistant street superintendent will inspect water and sewer installation for the first phase. A final plat of the first phase must be completed in three years, of the second phase in 5 years, of the third phase in 14 years, and of phase four in 23 years. Brice Black abstained because as Street Superintendent his department must approve inspections.

The Commission recommended to the City Council a new fee schedule for zoning and subdivision control. I did not see the schedule. It discussed changing the subdivision ordinance so that simple two- or three-lot subdivisions have a simpler process for approval than large subdivisions. This matter will be taken up again in a January 27 meeting at 5:00 before the City Council meeting. The Commission approved the 2025 meeting schedule, with meetings on the third Thursday of the month at 5:30 (and BZA meetings at 6:30). The schedule also has filing deadlines on Tuesdays preceding the meeting at 3:00 pm and a public notice date 14 days prior to the meeting.

I did not stay for the BZA meeting because the agenda only had election of officers and approval of the meeting schedule.

A map of the subdivision is in this post. The only difference between the updated map and this one is that the lot numbers of phase one have been reversed.

Open Houses

On Saturday both Saint Augustine School and the newly-forming Harvest Christian Academy had open houses. I stopped by both.

Saint Augustine School opened in 1903, though not in its present building. The original building was located in the corner of what is now the parking lot. The people visiting while I was there were interested in enrolling in the kindergarten. The announcement of the open house mentioned that the parish was 140 years old. I checked the Hoosier State Chronicles and found these notes in the Rensselaer Republican for 1884 and 1885:

3 Jan 1894 In a long list of improvements in Rensselaer for 1883 and their values:  Additional work on Catholic Church, $1400.

17 April 1884: Last Monday was a great day with our Catholic fellow citizens. Their “rattle'’ came off and the new bell was christened and hoisted to its place in the belfry of their neat little church where it now warns the faithful of their duty three times a day, morning noon and night.

31 July 1884 Mr. Alfred McCoy propounded the question to this pastor of the Catholic congregation, “Why don't you finish your church building?” The pastor replied that they lacked the means. “How much will it take?” said McCoy. The reply was, about $400. “Well,” said McCoy, “go ahead and finish it, put me down for $25. I want to see the boards pulled out of those windows.” Mr. McCoy had already made a donation of $100 towards the building. 

27 Nov 1884 The windows of the new Catholic church are at last being put in place, the furniture of the church will soon arrive, and, we are glad to announce, the building is soon to be dedicated. Bishop Dwenger will be present at the dedication, we understand.

18 Dec 1884  The fine brick church building of our Catholic brethren is now almost completed and furnished. The gallery is now in process of erection, and when that is completed the building will be ready for dedication. The dedication services will take place as soon as Bishop Dwenger can spare a Sunday for the purpose. 

8 Jan 1885 The Dedication of the new Catholic church will take place on Sunday, January 18th, 1885, Bishop Dwenger officiating.

That first church building was demolished long ago to make room for the current building. However, the open house was exactly 140 years after the dedication of the first St. Augustine church.

The Harvest Christian Academy is planning to open this fall in one wing of the Core Building. Their slogan is already on their entrance to their wing of the Core Building.

Both Saint Augustine's and Harvest Academy were telling parents of the vouchers available in Indiana that can be used for students in private schools. The cost for many students attending a private school is about the same as attending a public school.

Harvest Academy had one classroom staged to show what a Kindergarten or first-grade classroom might look like.

Odds & ends

Aydas purchased a building next to the Ritz some time ago and their plans did not work out. Here is their explanation of what happened.

JCEDO announed two more façade grants.

The new façade at Short Cuts looks like it is finished except for signage. It was done without a façade grant.

Adam Alson has resigned from the board of Apple Seed and refers questions to the new director, Anthony Butler. Appletree would not have happened if not for the dedication and persistence of Mr Alson.

Bazz's roller rink is now offering breakfasts.

I had planned to publish this post after two County meetings on Tuesday, but decided waiting would make this post too long. The County meetings will wait for the next post.

The cold continues

 Winter weather continues. Every few days we warm up and we get a bit more snow. Then the sky clears and we get bitter cold. The sun melts snow from roofs, which leads to the formation of icicles. The forecast suggests this pattern will continue for most of the month.

City meetings


The City of Rensselaer announced on Facebook that Monday's Board of Public Works and the City Council meetings would be live streamed. Because the evening was very cold and the streets had patches of snow and ice, I decided to not attend them in person but to see how these first live-streamings would be.

I followed the link to the youtube site for the live stream, but had problems joining. The live stream did not automatically pop up but only appeared when I followed the link after it had started. The agenda had several items, most dealing with the waste-water treatment plant. Commonwealth Engineering had four sets of invoices for the project, and the Board approved amounts of $155,940.55, $198.56, $46,047.10, and $43,913.85. For work on getting the bonds issued, Bose McKinney & Evans was paid $30,000 and Baker Tilly $25,000. There were also two items from the water-tower project, a payment to Commonwealth Engineering for $823 and one to Maguire Iron for $105,165. The City is withholding $92,979.51 for outstanding issues and Maguire Iron is supposed to respond to a letter sent about those issues.

The meeting lasted about ten minutes. The video of the meeting is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C9Qo5F3Mkno. The City's youtube channel is at https://www.youtube.com/@RensselaerIN/streams.


Here is what the meeting looked like:


The Rensselaer City Council meeting had a separate live stream and again I could not find the stream until a couple minutes after it started. The first item on the agenda was the election of a Council president for 2025. The president for 2024 had been Noelle Weishaar and she was re-elected for 2025. A gas tracker increase was approved. I believe the new gas superintendent said it was 1¢ per hundred cubic feet, but the sound  was bad. 

The Council passed an ordinance that separates the Lintner and Drexel TIF districts for reporting purposes. They have been combined. The penultimate pay request, #9, to Grimmer for $56, 691.33 was approved. The vacation of part of Prairie Street was the next item considered, and Mrs Weishaar moved to terminate the request because of the objection of one of the adjacent property owners. She had inspected the area and said it needed to be kept clean. Her motion failed on a 2-3 vote. The Building Department will prepare an ordinance, though how the property will be split is not determined yet.

Next on the agenda was "2020 Census Redistricting." Apparently the City has not adjusted its wards to reflect the census, though it does not matter much because we vote for all Council candidates, not just the one from our ward. Mr Davis presented two options that I could not see, and the Council told him to develop one of them to present at a future meeting. 

A person from Peerless Midwest, a company that does water-well protection, gave an update. The company will do some modeling to the various well fields. An advisory committee will be formed to watch for potential threats to the wells. The  Council approved a request from the electric department for a pre-downpayment of $97,668 for a new digger truck that will be ready in early 2026. 

The Clerk/Treasurer said she had received all the nepotism forms. The Line Department sent two linemen to help restore power in Kentucky after a recent snowstorm. Baker Tilly is working on a planning document for the Line Department. The Building Department announced Plan and BZA meetings for the 16th, a Redevelopment Authority meeting for the 23rd, and a special Plan Commission meeting before the Council meeting on the 27th. Plans to cross I-65 with water and sewage lines are almost completed. The recycling department took delivery of a new truck. The Gas Utility is planning a new gas line to the old light plan. There are three applicants for a vacancy in the Gas Utility. The meeting adjourned at 6:43 and the recording of the meeting can be found here.

A couple of notes on streaming: I had to turn the sound volume on my computer to the maximum to hear the meeting. The speakers podium is directly below the two cameras so a viewer could not see someone at that podium. It should probably be moved either forward or backward so one of the cameras will catch it. Overall the streaming went well and did not have the problems that many of the County Zoom meetings have had.

Tourism Commission meeting

The Jasper County Tourism Commission met on Tuesday morning in the conference room of the Carnegie Center. This year starts with two new members, Erica Kingman appointed by the Rensselaer City Council and Randy Rottler appointed by the County Commissioners. The meeting had a quorum, with one member attending via Zoom. As the longest serving member, Jannelle Musch presided. For some reason the Commission did not elect a new president, perhaps an oversight. It approved the minutes of the last meeting that had had a quorum, the October meeting.

There was a long discussion of a proposal to sign an agreement with Placer AI, a company that uses cell-phone location to determine how many people attend events, where they come from, and where they go. The Tourism director had negotiated new prices, $20K for a first year and $23K for an optional second year. The discussion was about how the data could be used and whether the benefits would exceed the costs. The item was tabled to the February meeting.

The Commission reviewed and accepted the Innkeepers tax report that showed through the end of November the receipts were slightly less in 2024 than in 2023 but up substantially from 2022.

Organizations that receive grants are supposed to report back to the Commission on how the grants promoted tourism. The Fair Board had submitted a report on the horse barn at the Fairgrounds but no representative was available so that item was postponed until February. In their written report, they listed horse shows held in April, June, September, and October.

The Connection Center thanked the Commission for the grant it had received and noted that it was partnering with local businesses. Since its opening in May, it has seen lots of growth. A couple of travel baseball teams from other counties are using the Center for weekly practices. The Center has had a number of camps and the public is finding uses for the Center that the organizers never expected. The medical side of the Connection Center has grown. They currently have 253 members with a goal of 400 by May. They want to be self-supporting and think that will be easier once they pay off their mortgage, hopefully by the end of 2026.


A grant of $4500 from the Tourism Commission to the LEAP Foundation helped fund two murals at the Belstra Farm and Garden Greenhouse. A written report for that grant was received by the Commission.

In 2026 the Commission plans to change the schedule for reviewing grant applications. They will be done quarterly rather than as they randomly come in. The members had a short discussion about advertising in the magazine Travel Indiana and approved an option that will cost $1800, with some conditions.

I hope that the Commission decides to use Placer AI. There are so many questions it could answer, especially about what draws visitors to the County and which of the grants it has given seem to have been worthwhile.

Airport Authority Commission meeting

I had problems joining this meeting on Zoom. The Airport's website had not been updated for 2025 and using a Zoom link from 2024 did not work. There was an agenda and link posted on Facebook, but the link on the agenda was not clickable. After entering the link manually, I was put into the waiting room where I stayed for several minutes. I finally joined the meeting as the Finance Committee meeting was ending.

I missed the election of officers but from the audio I could tell that Andrew Andree had been elected president. There was no video of the meeting room and the Airport Manager, Emily Hackler, was attending remotely and appeared to be sick. The Airport's engineer said that work was continuing on the master plan and that planning was moving forward for the construction of a new t-hangar but that lots of approvals were needed. (It will use federal funding, and with the funding comes federal red tape.)

The manager's report was given by Isaac Gibson, the assistant manager. There are two hangar vacancies in the old building. There were 8779 operations (takeoffs and landings) in 2024. Six people have signed up for a ground school that starts January 19. There will be an Aviation Career Day on May 9. The Board approved an additional appropriation for a new engine and also approved a hangar rental for a person who bought a plane from the person who was previously renting the hangar. The Board approved advertising for a hay lease on 27 acres and also the holiday schedule. There was a discussion of what was needed to complete a land swap of about 27 acres, with the Airport getting land to its west in exchange for land it owns along SR 114. The Board approved a couple of motions to move that swap along. The swap will need approval of the Rensselaer Plan Commission.

The Board approved the recommendation from the finance committee on investment policy.

Etcetera

In the previous post I visited Brick Built Cafe and Coworking, a new realty office and cafe. Here is the post by the owner explaining why she closed S-blended and opened this new business. A ribbon cutting is scheduled for 9:30 on Friday, January 17.

I had a picture of one of the SJC trucks used for CDL training and thought that there was only one design. I was wrong.

This coming Saturday two elementary schools will have open houses. Saint Augustine School will have a two-hour open house from 10:00 until noon until 2:00 and the soon-to-be Harvest Christian Academy will have one from 10:00 until 4:00.

For several years I thought the word penultimate was the most useless word in the English language. Then I discovered that antepenultimate is considered a word and preantepenultimate is being considered for inclusion in dictionaries.

Stay warm and drive carefully.

A few bits of news

Park Board meeting

The Rensselaer Park Board met Monday evening. They heard details about an upcoming event, the Woodchuck-It Disc Golf Tournament scheduled for February 1. One purpose of the event is to raise funds for concrete tee pads for the disc golf course. Playing the course gives a person a one-mile walk. There is hope that a disc-golf league might be established this summer.

The move of the Park office from Iroquois Park to the old light plant continues. There is hope that the new office may be able to host the February Chamber of Commerce luncheon. Upcoming projects include new metal roofs for the pool house and the Gifford Shelter. 

The Park Superintendent mentioned that she was exploring using the website SeeMyLegacy for fundraising, highlighting memorials and other park features, and informing the public about the parks. The Board discussed fees for renting Filson Park and its shelter. Ultimately they decided to charge $250 to rent the whole park for a day and $75 to rent just the shelter. Those fees might not apply to civic organizations doing events open to the public.

The leases of the Blacker Fields for tournaments have been signed but there was no mention of how many tournaments are scheduled. This year there will be no fencing to help collect entrance fees. There was a discussion of the dog park and of a person who has not been following the rules of the dog park.

When asked what the future use of the Iroquois building that has been serving as Park headquarters, the Park Superintendent said that she hopes it can be demolished. That would open up the back section of Iroquois Park that presently is not used. A board member asked about Columbia Park and was told that a lot of maintenance has recently been done there, significantly improving its appearance. There is an effort underway to have the park baseball teams play teams from surrounding communities.

Now open

The space that was occupied by S- blended Nutrition is now Brick Built Real Estate Cafe & Coworking. The smoothies are mostly gone, replaced with coffee and snacks. The official opening and ribbon cutting will be January 17. 

The space also serves as an office for the local branch of Brick Built Real Estate. The main office is in Granger and most of the realtors are in the South Bend region. I asked about the very untraditional feel of this office and was basically told that it was a feature, not a bug.

The co-working part is free. They have free wi-fi and anyone can come in, set up a laptop, and work. In addition to tables designed for eating, there are three that are specifically designed for computer use.

There are some very comfortable chairs in the front.

The S-blended business used one supplier for its drinks. The Brick Built Cafe will be using more local suppliers for its coffee and food items. Check out this new, or sort-of-new, business.

Other

On Wednesday the Chamber of Commerce had a luncheon with Christine Bogan, a financial advisor at Edward Jones, as the speaker. She touched on many topics, including ways to and the need to accumulate an emergency fund. Something that younger people may not realize is that the money tucked away in retirement accounts to avoid income taxes will eventually be taxed when the holder reaches the mandatory age, which keeps changing. It is now 73, up from 72 last year, which in turn was up from 70.5. If you have IRAs or can transfer other retirement savings to an IRA and you make charitable gifts to not-for-profit organizations, you may find that you can cut taxes with qualified charitable distributions from an IRA. However, you must be at least 70.5 when the distribution is made. I think most or all the local non-profits get at least some of their donations in this form.

On Thursday evening Mount Hood Pizza announced on its Facebook page:

We would like to announce the merger of Not Your Typical Wingz with Mt Hood Pizza & Grill!

We are excited about the addition of Robert Hearod as Co-Owner. Robert brings not only his food experience background but his FULL MENU from Not Your Typical Wingz!

Addendum: I initially forgot to mention where the painting shown in the previous post was. The comment on the post identified it as Dr Markley's office, which is in the Huth-Thompson building on Drexel Drive.

January is off to a cold start

 Mystery window

During December I posted many pictures of decorated windows. Here is what I think is a final one. I would never have found it if I had not been told were it is. Do you know where it is? If so, tell everyone by leaving a comment.

If no one answers, I will tell where I found it in my next post.

New Commissioners

County government has two new Commissioners for 2025 and they got a workout on Tuesday morning. At 8:00 the Board of Finance met. It is required to meet between the first and last Mondays of January and the three County Commissioners are its members. The Board elected Rein Bontreger as president and Tammy McEwen, the County Treasurer, as secretary/treasurer. It approved an investment policy for 2025, which the Board members had in written form. The State severely limits how counties can invest funds, limiting them to liquid, safe assets such as CDs and Treasury notes. The County has over $30 million in various accounts that the Treasurer invests and last year the County earned more than $1 million on those funds. The meeting lasted only about 15 minutes.

The Commissioners meeting that followed was not as short, lasting about two and a half hours. Rein Bontreger was elected president and Ryan Hilton was elected vice president. The next item on the agenda was the opening of highway bids for various items that the Highway Department uses. This took about twenty minutes and involved a lot of prices that made no sense to me but were important for the Highway Department. As in past years, all bids were accepted so that if the low-price supplier cannot deliver, the County can get the material when it is needed.

A new State law now requires that contracts that the Sheriff previously approved must now receive Commissioner approval. The Commissioners approved a contract for battery maintenance. They also approved the yearly forfeiture audit. Finally, they approved the retirement of K-9 dog Alpha.

The Coroner wanted to make sure that the change in Commissioners would not interrupt planning for a new forensic center. Sharon Colee from Community Services had several items for Commissioner approval. A furnace at the Fase Center failed and was replaced at $5200. She wants a railing at the entrance of the Fase Center to help those who are mobility impaired. Both of these items were approved. She had investigated getting DeMotte water for the Fase Center but there is no nearby water main, so the cost would be over $100,000. She wants the Commissioners to do a walk through of the Rensselaer Center to see maintenance issues.

Last year the Commissioners approved $30,000 from Opiod settlement money to the House of Grace and Tammy Tidd, head of the House of Grace, would like a similar amount this year. In the four years that they have had a location in Rensselaer, they have served 19 women and have two current women living here with another pending. The local facility can handle up to four women. I think she said that they have bought a house here. The Commissioners decided to make a decision on the request in February.

The Commissioners approved the replacement of an employee in the Clerk's Office who retired at the end of last year. The Office is still short-staffed because an employee is on maternity leave. The Commissioners also approved two conference requests from the Health Department. They were skeptical, however, at the Department's request to fill a full-time position for a second person to do food inspections and septic-tank inspections. The Health Department argued that the position would be needed because two new subdivisions are going in near DeMotte. The matter will be on the agenda again in February. 

The transfer of the Remington EMS building to the County was delayed because one of the people signing did not have the proper seal. Next on the agenda was "Arrowhead Grant." I could not find the full name of the Arrowhead organization, but it gives small grants in our area. The Commissioners could not think of any programs that might benefit, but said "maybe next year.

The next 20 or 25 minutes were devoted to appointments to boards and various office positions. In most cases the current members were retained. There were several applicants for the Airport Authority Board and the Commissioners approved Tommy Gutwein. Noah Hoek and Chad Healy were added to the Citizens Advisory Board for Land Acquisition. The Community Corrections Advisory Board adds Jake Misch, Justin DeYoung, and Clifford Robinson (who may be the new head of the Public Defenders Office). Ryan Hilton was added to several boards, including the Fair Board, Kankakee River Regional Planning Board, and the Jasper County Plan Commission. Craig Standish will be new on the Northwest Solid Waste District. Both were added to the Water and Sewer Board. Jake Misch wanted off the Property Tax Board of Appeals and will be replaced by someone whose name I did not catch. Risk Management Board added Diana Boersma and Craig Standish. The commissioners appointed George Hamstra to the Town of DeMotte Plan Commission and John Schwab to the Remington BZA. 

Employee bonds were approved for employees who handle money. Three buried cable requests were approved. There was a brief discussion of plans to renovate a barn at the County Highway Department and the Commissioners approved getting bids to move along the process. The County has received safety grants and needs to request proposals to implement them. One citizen expressed concern about a plan for an unelected regional government. 

If needed, the meeting was continued until January 21 at 8:30 in the Commissioners' Room in the Court House.

After a short recess, the Drainage Board met. Craig Standish was elected president, Ryan Hilton Vice President, and Rhonda Eldridge secretary. Jacob Ahler will serve as the Board' attorney. There were also appointments to the various joint drainage boards with surrounding counties. 

The Board approved compensation for the Board's attorney of $10,000 plus $215 for any work not covered by the usual duties. Landowners drained by the Zimmer Ditch brought signatures to reconstruct the ditch. The next step will be for the surveyor to do a report outlining what work needs to be done and how much it will cost. The Board accepted certifications for the Sands Ditch and the R. E. Davis Ditch and approved signing a hold-harmless agreement with Genova Plastics. There was discussion of the need to update the County's drainage specifications because some of it is out of date.

These were the last meetings to be held at the Sparling Annex for at least a couple of months. When the remodeling is finished, the column in the center of the room will be gone.

Odds and ends

There was a Park Board meeting on Monday evening but this post is long enough already so I will write about it for the next post.

Rensselaer avoided heavy snow fall that the weekend brought both north and south of us. 

During January daylight increases by 47 minutes, with about two thirds of that coming by later sunsets and about one third by earlier sunrises. The reason that the two are unequal is due to the eliptical orbit of the earth and the fact that it earth is tilted on its axis. The perihelion for earth (when it is closest to the sun) just occurred on January 4. Did you enjoy the extra warmth on that day?

On January 1 I took a picture of the building trades house at SJC. It has windows and doors, so work inside can be a bit more comfortable than it would be without them.

Leaving SJC I noticed a new sign at one of the entrances. The hours for the open house are from 10 to 4.

SJC has an open house for its various certificate programs on January 25 from noon until 2:00.

Driving past SJC on Sunday I noticed that they had their semi-trucks used for CDL training decorated. I was able to get a picture on Tuesday.

Lirio Resources now has a Crown Point office.

Some highlights from 2024

 The City of Rensselaer completed two big projects this past year, the Brick Street Project and the new water tower near I-65. There were more pictures on this blog of construction of the Brick Street Project than of any other subject. Related, the Fire Department constructed a training tower and Filson Park was largely finished.

Some other ribbon cuttings this past year included Plevna, Building Trades as SJC, the HYPER Center at Brookside Park, the Water Tower mural, the new EMS building, Ayda's new outdoor dining room, the new location for the Clinic of Family Medicine, the new location for Franciscan Working Well, the new location of the Good Samaritan Food Pantry, La Trinidad Bakery, and a revived greenhouse at SJC.

Some other business openings included Brick Street Ice Cream and the Wine Room. A Mexican Grocery opened on Washington Street and closed several months later. Gutwein Seeds moved. Janet's Kitchen closed after the death of an owner and also closing was A& B Auto Care. A couple of businesses that last year's highlights post mentioned as opening, First Hometown Mortgages and Not Your Typical Wingz, are gone. Also closing was the Jasper County Recovery House.

The primary and general elections gave us some new County officials, including a new judge, new auditor, two new commissioners, and a new councilman. The Carpenter Wind Farm got its final regulatory approval and should be starting construction early in 2025.

The High School has a new concession stand for the baseball field. SJC opened classes for CDL training and began hosting a branch of the Indiana Ag and Technical School. Mural week focused on Remington, but Cameron Moberg painted one in downtown Rensselaer. Rein Bontreger did one visible from the bowstring arch bridge and another on the pool house at Brookside Park.

(This summary was compiled with a quick scan through past posts. Undoubtedly I have omitted some things that should be included. You can add in the comments anything you think should be included.)

The picture below was taken on December 5 after several very cold days. We will see a lot more river ice in January.