What happened at Monday's meetings?

 I swung by Genova late last week to see if I could see the construction that the Company had been planning. I found the skeleton of a large building.

When I walk into my backyard, I am swarmed by mosquitos.  The joys of summer.

The next dollar day at the LaRue Pool is July 9. The pool has evening hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The Rensselaer Farmers market has begun their Tuesday afternoon sessions.

The Jasper County Commissioners met with a long agenda of rather routine items. There were five buried cable requests that sought permission to use County right-of-ways. Three were approved and the other two simply updated information for previously approved projects. A citizen had a complaint about excessive dust on CR 400 E and another wanted a cul-du-sac on CR 980N because a neighbor had made it very difficult for delivery trucks to turn around at the end of the dead-end road. Back in 1991 the Commissioners had voted to vacate some alleys in Gifford but did not follow up with a required ordinance. On Monday they passed the ordinance so the alleys are now officially vacated.

Two bids for paving were received, one from Milestone and the other from Town & Country. Both were accepted and so the County Highway Department can use whichever works best on a project. The Commissioners had asked KIRPC whether a specific source of grants might be used to fund sidewalk reconstruction around the  Court House and were told that the source was not appropriate. KIRPC will be doing traffic counts on various County roads and asked the Commissioners if they had any specific roads they wanted included. Ken Wright, the new director of Community Corrections who was officially appointed later in the meeting, received approval for a grant application. (The Commissioners require all grant applications made by County departments to be brought before them so the grants are on record for the State Board of Accounts.)

The Commissioners signed papers for a Community Crossings grant. Since 2016 when the program began, the County has spent $9.96 million for road improvements funded by these grants. About $6 million was State funding and the other 40% was County matching funds. At a previous meeting the Commissioners had approved opening a line-of-credit with Demotte State Bank to fund work on the Kankakee River. At this meeting they approved and signed the final loan agreement. They also approved allowing the Surveyors office to give contour data to a landowner. 

The Health Department was given permission to replace their Director of Vital Records. The position will become part-time because at the June meeting the Department was allowed to make the food inspector position full-time in exchange for making the Director of Vital Records part time when the current Director retired.

40.8% of the County has been vaccinated for Covid. Vaccinations will continue at the Health Department but people seeking the vaccine will need to register either on-line or by calling 211.

Mark Sinclair provided estimates for repairs to the Animal Control building. Some of the repairs were needed before a recent accident in which a car ran into the building, and the Commissioners wanted to know what the insurance settlement would be before they approved anything, so the item will reappear on next month's agenda.

Sharon Collee gave an update on what Community Services is doing. They will be receiving two new vans this fall and two more next year. She will be requesting an extra $5000 in the budget for next year; the budget for Community Services is included in the Commissioners budget (as a many other things). Two bids were received to seal coat and paint the parking lots of the Sparling Annex and the Court House. The bids differed by only $200 and the low bid was accepted.  The Commissioners signed a road-use agreement with NextEra, the company that will build the Dunn's Bridge solar project in Kankakee Township.  The County Fair will be able to use a County Fork lift to set up and tear down for the fair. The Commissioners approved four rezone requests that had been recommended by the Plan Commission.

The Sheriff's Department has had more than usual turnover. The Commissioners approved replacing four deputies who left. One joined the DeMotte Police Department and the other three found jobs outside of law enforcement. The Commissioners also approved replacing a corrections officer. There was a short discussion about the cost of new deputies. Some have to go to the police academy and others need to pair with experienced officers, and both reduce the number of units on patrol. Uniform and equipment costs for a new hire are about $15,000. The Commissioners also approved a grant that the Sheriff was seeking.

The Commissioners passed an ordinance that will allow broadband improvements to get favorable tax treatment. They also passed an ordinance setting new fees for using or crossing County right-of-way and signed paperwork for two bridge projects that they had approved at a recent meeting. 

There was a discussion of where early voting could take place. State regulations say it must be near the County Clerk's office, which is on the second floor of the Court House. In the past it has been in the hallway. The plan for the future is to have two voting booths and they require eight electrical outlets. However, there are only six in the hallway. Placing them in the Commissioner's Room was suggested, but there were concerns of whether the room would meet ADA requirements.

A meeting of the group planning events for the 125th anniversary of the Court House decided that October 15 would be the day for formal ceremonies. On November 13 there will be tours of the offices in the Court House. After a long discussion of whether to approve paying for an expensive coffee pot that has been the source of bad blood in the Court House, the Commissioners denied payment.

There was a Zoom option for this meeting, but as has been the case for most hybrid Zoom/in-person meetings, the audio was poor both ways. After three hours the meeting was continued to 8:30 on July 19th if necessary. Before next Tuesday's Council meeting there will be a joint Commissioners/Council meeting that will start at 5:00 pm. 

In the afternoon the Drainage Board met. NITCO is trying to provide high-speed internet to part of DeMotte and needs to install two miles of fiber that will cross four ditches. The application was approved. There is a small drainage of 420 acres that straddles the White-Jasper County line with most of the drainage in White County. White County requested that Jasper County waive its rights so that it could establish a maintenance fund to fix the ditch and the Drainage Board approved. 

The last item was from NextEra for the Dunn's Bridge solar project. They needed approval from the Drainage Board to get building permits from Planning and Development. They provided the Commissioners with a map showing all the crossings of drains. The Commissioners wanted more detail, and that detail may have been provided to the Highway Department and the Surveyor's office. NextEra says it will submit papers on each of the individual crossings at a future date. The Commissioners wanted to see a study of how the panels will affect runoff—will there be effects on neighbors. The Commissioners gave preliminary approval so the building permits can be issued. 

There was a reminder that there was a joint Jasper-Newton Drainage Board meeting on Tuesday. The Newton County surveyor died very recently and has not yet been replaced.

Appleseed Childhood Education, which is working on creating a childhood education center in Rensselaer, recently announced that its partner, Right Steps Child Development Centers, had received a grant of $100,000 to help get a Rensselaer center established. More here.

Water, art, and other miscellany to start July

The rain finally stopped. Amounts varied by location as many showers were very localized, but we had some rain for six days, every day from June 25 through June 30. The Iroquois finally hit minor flood stage on June 30, was above flood stage all day on July 1, and slipped below flood stage on July 2. 

Daily river flow records were set on Thursday and Friday and perhaps on Wednesday. When I checked the website on Thursday, the flow was1590 cubic feet per second, easily surpassing the previous record of 1200 from 2015. On Friday the flow was 1430, surpassing the previous record of 1070 set in 1993.  (The record for Saturday was also set in 1993, at 1180. Early on Saturday the flow was higher but headed downward, so it is unlikely that the average flow will exceed 1180.)

Weston Pond has refilled. It might last long enough for amphibians to breed.

The road through Weston Cemetery was under water in several places, including the bridge over the Maxwell Ditch.

North of Rensselaer the fields south of the Antcliff Subdivision were flooded.

The corn seems to be doing very well, though it will die where the water stands too long. I had both tomato plants and beans that did not like all the water and are not looking good. The weeds, however, seemed to have loved all the moisture. I suspect the mosquitoes will be a problem soon.

All the rain has sprouted mushrooms, including some in fairy rings.

Speaking of insects, the invasion of the Japanese beetles has begun. We never did get the cicadas that swarmed in other parts of the midwest. 

Next week the Fendig Summer Theater will have performances on Thursday through Sunday. The performances will be in Foundation Park and you should probably bring your own lawn chair. I stopped by a rehearsal on Friday. I was told that this year those going into 9th grade will be able to be in the productions because they lost out last year. Despite that, the numbers of actors is below what it has been in the past.

McKinley Street was paved this past week.

The Rensselaer Republican had a nice article on the McKinley Manor.

The old warehouse building on Vine Street for the City's Electric Department has been removed and the site is ready for its replacement.

The vet clinic under construction has some decorative masonry that was not there the last time I stopped by.

The LaRue Pool had a dollar day on Friday. Attendance was decent but would have been a lot more if the temperatures had not been so cool.

The Tourism Commission met on Friday morning in a Zoom meeting.  Feedback about the DeMotte Art has been very positive. Preparations continue for the Jasper Jaunt, a bike ride on August 7 that will have an agritourism focus. Riders will visit several destinations and will get a tee shirt.

The Commission considered and granted two requests for funds. The first was from the Daughters of the American Revolution for Wreathes Across America. This winter they will decorate graves of veterans in Weston Cemetery. The other was for the Rensselaer Art Walk. The funding that they granted will make it possible to have several artists paint murals sometime in July. Before this meeting I had not heard anything about this. Keep an eye open for details.

Have an enjoyable 4th of July. (Even though there are no public, organized fireworks for the weekend, we will have plenty of private fireworks to watch and hear.)

Rensselaer in 1904

1904 was traumatic for many Rensselaer residents because in the spring of that year the oldest bank in the County, the bank of A. McCoy and Company, failed and many depositors lost much of what they had in the bank. The bank was founded in 1854 by Alfred McCoy and Alfred Thompson, but the person running the bank in 1904 was the son of Alfred McCoy, Thomas McCoy. Tom McCoy was the first mayor of Rensselaer after it became a City in 1896 and ultimately served time in prison for his role in the collapse of the bank.

The October 1, 1904 issue of the Jasper County Democrat, one of three Rensselaer newspapers at the time, was devoted the bright side of life in Rensselaer. It gave glowing reviews to many of Rensselaer's businesses. It did not feature all businesses (there were businesses not mentioned that had ads in the issue of the paper) and it is not clear why some were chosen and others neglected. However, the issue provides a snapshot of the sorts of businesses that were operating in the Rensselaer in 1904. This post will summarize the contents of that issue with links to those bits of it that I have posted on various findagrave sites. If there is no link or if I include the snippet in this post, I could not find the business owner in a local cemetery.

The paper said that there were four banks operating in the City. It seems to include a private bank of John Makeever, who may not have been very active by 1904. Also included was the Rensselaer Bank ( H.O. Harris, E.T. Harris), the First National Bank organized in 1902 as a successor to the Commercial State Bank (Addison Parkison, John Wasson, E. L. Hollingsworth), and the newly organized State Bank of Rensselaer (John Eger, Delos Thompson, Granville Moody).

There were several stores selling dry goods such as clothing, including Benton Forsythe's Chicago Bargain Store, Rowles & Parker, Murray's Cash Store, the 99 Cent Racket Store, and the hat shop of L. M. Imes. Murray had started his business with James Ellis, who left to run an opera house and was in 1904 the mayor of Rensseler. Murray's lasted by far the longest of these stores, closing in 1965. There was no mention of any stores owned by the Leopolds or Fendigs; the Fendig's Fair, which I believe was a shoe store, was in operation at the time. Rensselaer had a jewelry store run by P. W. Clark. Jay Williams had a furniture store. After his suicide, the business was bought by Willis Wright, who in 1904 had the funeral home and was the County Coroner.  R. P. Benjamin sold pianos and organs. There were two drug stores mentioned, those of Joseph Larsh and of A. F. Long.

Rensselaer had three hardware stores: Warner Brothers, E.D. Rhoades,  and William Eger. The issue lists two blacksmith shops, one of M. L. Hemphill and the other Hemphill Brothers. I wonder if these were one and the same because the Hemphill brothers were sons of M.L. Hemphill and he was very old in 1904. Donnelly Lumber was operating on College Avenue next to the Iroquois River and it seems also at a second location. 

There were three dentists included: Drs Horton,  W.L. Myer, and H. L. Brown. The only doctors mentioned were two osteopaths, Turfler & Turfler. (The Professional Cards column of the Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican a few days earlier listed Drs E. C. English, A.J. Miller, W. Hartsell, A.L. Berkley, S.C. Johnson, and I.M. Wasburn [sic]).

Two groceries were listed, those of John Eger and J.J. Eigelsbach. Eger was the second mayor of the City and also president of the newly formed State Bank. George Goff and Son ran a restaurant, Conrad Kellner, who later became a mayor or Rensselaer, ran what seemed to be a bar but was call a buffet. G.A. Strickfaden ran a saloon. The two hotels in operation in 1904 were the Makeever House and the Nowels Hotel. 

Several businesses provided services to the agricultural community. Charles Roberts sold farm equipment. There were two providers of harnesses, Scott Brothers and  Matthew Worden. Dr Harvey Kannal was a veterinarian. W. C. Babcock was still partnered with A. R. Hopkins in the elevator business; he later bought him out. Fred Phillips specialized in livestock auctions not just in Rensselaer but in several states. B. S. Fendig bought and sold poultry. He later left Rensselaer and ended up in New Orleans. J.C. Fisher had a feed barn and sold bailed hay, oats, and chop feed. 

Rensselaer did not suffer from a shortage of lawyers. E. P. Honan and the duo of Austin & Hopkins are buried in Weston Cemetery (though I am not sure on Hopkins). Not buried locally were the duos of Ferguson & Ferguson and Baughman & Williams as well as Jesse Wilson. Additional lawyers listed in the Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican from the same time were Ray D. Thompson, W.H. Parkison, J. Hunt, and the firm of Foltz & Spitler that also included H. Kurrie.

Irwin and Irwin sold real estate and insurance. C.J. Dean was also a realtor and William Donahue sold real estate in the Dakotas for those interested in cheaper land (and also ran a restaurant).  Joe Jackson ran a taxi service. The widow of Joseph Sharp had continued his photography studio. C Vick had a newsstand and also was the City's constable. 

How many of these people have you heard of?

Changing businesses and three meetings

Another new business has opened in Rensselaer, Rule Auto Care. It is located in what was previously Charlie Robert's Auto Sales. I really like their logo.

They have a nice reception area/waiting room and the service desk is behind a garage door that was an exterior door when the Robert's family owned the building.

There will be a grand opening or ribbon cutting in the future. The Rules wanted to have a quiet opening but so far have been very busy. 

The front part of the building that was the old show room is available for rent as is space in the two-story building behind the new garage. The large warehouse building on Weston Street was sold at the beginning of the month. Rule Auto Care is open Monday through Friday from 8 to 5.

Below is a picture of the start of construction for an expansion to Pipestone Veterinary Services on the corner of US 231 and Wood Road.

Alliance Bank has completely remodeled their lobby. The teller area has been rotated 90 degrees.

Walmart continues their remodeling. The main restrooms are under construction so there are temporary restrooms on the north side of the building.

The river has risen but as I write this it is still a few inches below flood stage. Pehaps more rain in the next few days will push it over flood stage (12 feet). The daily flow is much less than what it was in June of 2015 when we had a major flood, with the river getting to a bit over 16 feet.

There were three meetings on Monday evening, the Rensselaer City Council met at 6:00 and the Jasper County BZA met at 7:00, followed by the meeting of the Jasper County Plan Commission. The City Council meeting had a light agenda with no big items.

The Council was asked their opinion of a plan by Ayda's to redo their sidewalks so that they could be used for outdoor seating. Ayda's had originally wanted to have some tree islands in the sidewalk but trees in the downtown sidewalks have not worked out well so they were considering planter boxes instead. The Council said they liked the concept and wanted Ayda's to continue working with City officials. The sidewalk along Van Rensselaer has been torn up and Ayda's intends to replace the sidewalk along Harrison as well.

Turning to the agenda, the Council approved putting insurance proceeds from a damaged police car back in the Police Department's budge. (The car hit a deer.)  It approved transfers of funds for two departments and also approved the purchase of .23 acres at Wood and Mattheson for a lift station for the upcoming sewer project. The Project Manager was given permission to get quotes for a replacement of a 2012 backhoe that is heavily used but keeps having problems.

The City wants to update its comprehensive plan that was last updated in 2007. It will need grant money to do this and the first step is an income survey. The Council approved $1500 for the survey. The Council approved Juneteenth as a holiday for 2021 but will also need to amend the salary ordinance before City employees will have the day off.

In comments from the City superintendents, the Police Chief noted that his department was at full strength after the latest hire had completed work at the police academy. The City Attorney suggested that the City needs some kind of loitering ordinance because there are  problems from people hanging out in the City parking lot across the River from Potawatomi Park. Weather permitting, paving of McKinley Street will begin Wednesday. The high-rate treatment plant has been working since Friday. The rain gauge at the sewage plant recorded 4.5 inches of rain since Friday. The City has accumulated enough surplus stuff that it will begin planning for an auction. The City has applied for something called a Swift grant. The matching requirements are unclear and the City will use its financial consultant Baker-Tilley to deal with the red tape involved.

The Jasper County BZA met at 7:00 at the Sparling Annex with a Zoom option. Once again there were audio problems for those on Zoom. The BZA had two items on the agenda. It approved a setback variance for a pole structure that will be 17 feet from the back property line. The second item approved was a frontage variance. In this case the petitioner wants to combine ten undeveloped lots and an undeveloped road in the Georgetown subdivision into two big lots. If the road is vacated so it deadends at the property line, the frontage for one lot is less than the Code requires. The variance was approved. At the end of the Plan Commission meeting that followed, the Plan Commission also approved the proposal to combine the ten lots and the undeveloped road into two new lots.

The Plan Commission had several requests for rezoning. The one that was most interesting and took the longest was a proposal that had been discussed several months ago, a plan to build cabins for short-term rentals on a 60+ acre site with a small lake. This proposal had been floated at the April meeting and no action was taken. At this meeting the request was to rezone part of the parcel from A1 to A2 so that three buildable lots could be created. The plan is to sell these lots for residences. The developers wanted the rest of the roughly 60 acres to be rezoned PR, Parks and Recreation. There is nothing in the planning code that fits a proposal for short-term cabin rentals, but the PR zoning seemed closest. Because vacation rentals is not one of the three uses specified for the PR zoning, the BZA would need to grant a special exception before any construction occurred.

After discussion, with members of the public voicing both concerns and support, the Commission recommended approving the rezoning requests. The matter now passes to the Commissioners, who have final say. However, this approval is only the first of several that must be obtained. 

The rest of the requests were more routine. Perkins Good Earth Farms requested a rezone from A2 to A4 for two acres. A4 is ag business and the farm is now selling produce from their barn. It was approved and will go to the Commissioners. A request to split a lot into two lots to create a two-lot subdivision was approved. A request to rezone a 6.5 acre lot from A1 to R (residental) and then split it into three lots to from a subdivision was approved. The land is surrounded by current subdivisions. The next meetings will be July 19 if there are items on the agenda.

A quiet week

 Erica's Boutique opened this week and had a ribbon cutting on Friday

The shop sells women's clothing and accessories. The Rensselaer Republican's story on the store is here.

The weather forecast says we will be having several days of rain and the total amount may be six or seven inches. Despite rain on Thursday, the LaRue Pool opened for the season. Its opening had been delayed first with a broken valve and then with leakage from expansion joints. The pool is over seventy years old and some of the plumbing that makes it work may be that old. Perhaps it is time to spend some money to update what needs to be updated. Although the Parks for People campaign has topped off, there are people who would donate if the donation were specifically for the pool. Also, Rensselaer will be getting over $6 million from the latest stimulus bill. Perhaps some of it could be used for infrastructure like the pool.

There was one brave swimmer on Friday a bit after noon.

The flag mural on the Campbell Printing building is finished.

The Tuesday night Cylinders and Snacks event is drawing respectable crowds.

However, I am not sure about the sorts of people it is bringing to Rensselaer.

The sidewalks along the section of McKinley Avenue that is being reconstructed were finished early this week.

More stone was being added to the street later in the week.

Pipestone Veterinary Services has begun adding an addition to the west end of their building. Alliance Bank has a new lobby.

The disc golf course at Brookside Park has a new sign.

I am not sure how long the new sign for the Health Department has been in front of the Sparling Annex.

Walmart has a new sign with a bigger logo and smaller letters.

The summer solstice was the past Monday. Now days are getting shorter. Summer flowers are blooming, such as milkweed.

Corn and soybeans are still fairly small, but wheat is ready to harvest.

The strawberry season is mostly over but blueberries are ripening.

Biplane rides will return to the Jasper County Airport on July 29-31. Cost is $80 for adults and $60 for children.

I have mentioned in past posts that the United Way of White County was administering a grant to aid not-for-profit organizations affected by Covid. At their June meeting the review committee awarded that last of the funds that were available for Pulaski and Jasper Counties. I had been worried that there might be money left on the table.