Hamilton County Reporter

Hamilton Southeastern got a big win in its first game of the season, sailing past
Muncie Central 95-50 Tuesday at the Bearcats’ gym.

The Royals were never troubled in this game, leading 45-18 at halftime and
finishing with 30 points in the fourth quarter. Five HSE players scored in
double figures: Landon Morris had 16 points, Noah Smith 14, Mabor Majak 14,
Chris Grubbs 13 and Aaron Etherington 12.

Grubbs and Morris both reached double-double status, as both pulled 10
rebounds. Southeastern had 53 team rebounds; Smith and Majak each collected
eight and Etherington corralled five.

Smith made seven steals and Majak blocked three shots.

Southeastern plays its next game at Pike next Tuesday.

The Tuesday after Thanksgiving has been seized upon by charitable organizations throughout America as Giving Tuesday.  Many nonprofit groups locally will be asking for your help again this year on November 27th.

The Hamilton Southeastern Schools Foundation has made #GivingTuesday one of their major fund-raising projects.

On Giving Tuesday, the foundation asks you to first make a donation at this link.

Secondly, take a picture or video of yourself holding your own “unselfie” sign.  Use the hashtags #HSSFunselfie and use @hsefoundation on social media on Giving Tuesday.

The Hamilton Southeastern School Board spent more than two hours listening to a proposal on grades K-8 redistricting, but will see the administration’s “preferred” redistricting map when it is released to the public online Monday, November 26.

Interim Assistant Superintendent William Carnes told the board that after a number of community meetings, and roughly 10,000 comments from the public, he and the firm contracted to assist in the process, Cooperative Strategies, submitted a redistricting map it identified as “Revised Scenario 1A.”  This absorbed the many comments received, and incorporated parts of Scenarios 1 & 2 that were produced as part of the public comment process.

Board members reviewed “Revised Scenario 1A” and had a number of comments and suggestions for change.

Based on board member comments, and more data yet to be reviewed by Dr. Carnes and his redistricting group, “Revised Scenario 1A” is a step toward the final map recommendation for the board, but will likely not be the final boundaries.

Once Superintendent Allen Bourff reveals his recommended, or “preferred,” redistricting plan November 26th, he will present that map to the school board at the regular meeting of the board November 28th.

Once the board reviews the “preferred” redistricting plan, the final vote on redistricting is set for the board meeting December 12th.

You can view the entire Power Point presented to the school board at the Tuesday morning work session at this link.

Let’s say your teenage son is out running around Fishers after curfew, you call the police, they find your son, return him home and write a ticket to your son.  Your son goes to court, pays a fine that will likely be paid by the parent.

Fisher Assistant City Attorney Lindsey Bennett told that story to the Fishers City Council Monday night in explaining why the city is updating its ordinances that lay out penalties for minor offenses.

Now, the parent in the story above would not need to pay the fine if the son is sentenced to community service instead of a fine that would likely be paid by the parent.

Bennett explained the overhaul of the penalty system is needed. She described the current ordinance as “convoluted” after many years of updates and changes.

You can read the entire new ordinance at this link.

The new Hub & Spoke $14 million, 85,000 square development planned on a plot of land southeast of the planned Nickel Plate Trail along 106th Street, has Fishers City Council approval of an incentive package that includes a 10-year real estate tax abatement, fee waivers and a deal for the city to lease space in the building.

The two men behind the Hub & Spoke design center project, Travis Tucker and David Decker, were both at the council session but did not speak before the council.

Megan Baumgartner told council members the plans are to have co-working and maker space in the building.  She said there will be training for people seeking work in the building trades.

The vote to approve the incentive package was unanimous.

In other city council news from Monday night’s session:

Fishers Police Chief Ed Gebhart administered the oath of office to four new police officers in his department.  The new officers are – John Settergren, Kevin Starkey, Nick Smiley and Keith Benbow.

Chief Gebhart saw officer Binh Denis Monday, and told the council officer Denis was “the most active and communicative that I’ve seen him since the accident.”  Binh has been fighting an infection in his leg and the chief says the infection appears gone but must be watched so the infection does not reappear.  The officer is in the fight to get healthy, Gebhart said, and Monday was a good day for him.  Officer Binh was badly injured in an early October off- duty motorcycle accident that happened in Brown County

During the City Council Finance Committee meeting held before the regular council session, Deputy Mayor Elliott Hultgren told committee members that the fire equipment and crew in the headquarters building near City Hall will be moved to the apartments at the Fuel Tank, off 126th Street near the YMCA.  The move will be needed when the entire fire headquarters building is demolished and rebuilt next year.

Sometimes, young people just need an adult to talk to about what’s going on in their lives.  For a number of years, the Youth Mentoring Initiative (YMI) has worked to provide adult mentors for Hamilton Southeastern School District students in need of a mentor.

I spoke with YMI Executive Director Alison Gatz about the work done by her nonprofit organization.

This past week, we got the answer the nation has been anxiously awaiting – Where will Amazon locate HQ2?

In my view, we all need to put this whole issue into some perspective.  First, I am convinced that Amazon knew exactly what they were going to do before all the bidding began.  I wrote about this on September 11th of 2017.  I referred to a Brookings Institution expert on these things, Richard Shearer.

Shearer argued that Amazon had already selected the site (actually, 2 sites) before the bidding process began, in order to extract more incentives in the end.  Looking back, it would appear Mr. Shearer was correct from the beginning.

Is it coincidence that the two sites selected in the New York City and Washington DC metro areas both are close to homes Jeff Bezos owns?  I don’t think so.

I am also suspicious of the last minute decision to award this economic development prize to two separate sites, not just one as was originally proposed.  Was that the plan from the beginning?

I saw a Twitter post just after the decision was announced from Hayleigh Columbo, an excellent reporter at the Indianapolis Business Journal.  Here is the Twitter post:

Hayleigh, I lived in Indy a good part of my life, growing up here in the 50s and 60s.  Trust me, Indy had a much bigger inferiority complex then.  Sadly, the city deserved it at that time.  This entire metro area is a much better place to live now compared to when I was in my formative years here.  The Indy area would not have come close to making the top 20 for a big “get” like Amazon in those days.

Fishers has a specific connection to the Central Indiana Amazon bid.  Our Mayor Scott Fadness was instrumental in fashioning the bid the Indy metro area submitted to Amazon.  Fadness was clear that Fishers was not a good candidate to land the HQ2 complex itself, but Fishers would have benefited greatly had Amazon come here.  I am certain a large number of people moving to the area would choose to live in Fishers.

Now that the process is over, there is one aspect of this that bothers me.  We all know some costly incentives were included in the Indy-area bid for HQ2.  Much of the offer almost certainly involved public support, in the form of tax benefits and even taxpayer support.

It is my belief that the Indy area governmental entities owe it to the taxpaying public to provide the details of what was offered to Amazon.  I do not buy into what many public officials are saying, believing that only the news media cares to know this information.

The public, in my view, is entitled to this information.  It is our tax money that was part of that offer and we all deserve to know.  There is no legitimate argument any longer supporting secrecy now that the decision has been made and Amazon did not accept our offer.

Based on everything I am reading, there are no plans to publicly reveal the details of the Indy metro Amazon bid.  I believe that is a very bad decision.

I would urge all public officials involved, and the many entities outside government  part of putting this bid together, to allow the taxpaying public the details of what you offered in all of our names.  I am not optimistic this will happen, but enough public pressure could change some minds in high places.

In the meantime, Amazon and elected officials on the winning side of the bidding process are dealing with some fairly stiff political blow-back now that their deal is publicly known.  Let’s see how that ends.

Hamilton County Reporter

Hamilton Southeastern continued its strong defensive start on Saturday, cruising past Fort Wayne Carroll 62-22 at the Chargers’ gym.

The Class 4A No. 4 Royals led 13-6 after the first quarter, but steamrolled through the second period to take a 37-11 halftime lead. Sydney Parrish led all scorers with 20 points, while Jackie Maulucci added 11 points.

Maulucci and Parrish each pulled eight rebounds, with Lydia Self clearing six
rebounds, and Amaya Hamilton and Tayah Irvin both collecting five. Hamilton and
Parrish both made four steals. This marked the fourth time this season that the Royals
have held an opponent to 22 points or less.

Southeastern is 7-0 and will host a big Hoosier Crossroads Conference game on
Tuesday. Brownsburg, ranked No. 8 in 4A, will visit the Royals’ gym for a 7:30 p.m.
tipoff.

by

Fred Swift

Hamilton County Reporter

Hamilton County is probably the only county in America where the number of iconic covered bridges is increasing. Most areas have either a decreasing number of the wooden structures or none at all.

Locally, we will soon have three. That may not seem like many, but given the small number of these picturesque bridges still standing, it is remarkable. And, the way it happens is a tribute to local interest in acquiring the structures from other counties where they can no longer afford to be maintained.

The most recent acquisition is the Bell Ford Bridge from Jackson County built in 1868. It has been stored in a barn since it was taken out of service on the East Fork of White River near Seymour a few years ago.

County Commissioner Mark Heirbrandt, who is acquainted with a commissioner in Jackson County, made the deal on behalf of Fall Creek Township and county park officials. The bridge will be moved in coming months to Geist Park on Fall Creek to become the historic centerpiece for the relatively new park.

“This bridge is the only combination post and truss bridge remaining anywhere,” Heirbrandt said Thursday. It has been placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The deal with Jackson County provides for a $25,000 donation to the Jackson County Round Barn Restoration Fund to enable that county to complete a move and restoration of a rare barn.

Potters Bridge just north of Noblesville was built in its present location in 1870 and is also now the focal point of Potters Bridge Park. Conner Prairie Pioneer Museum acquired another covered bridge several years ago. After repairs were made, it was placed on museum grounds over a small ravine as part of the Conner Prairie pioneer village.

(Editor’s Note:  The covered Bell Ford Bridge is coming to Geist Park, a Hamilton County facility that has been around for many years….this is not related to the new park on Geist Reservoir planned by the City of Fishers)

This was a record-breaking year for the Pasta Bowl with more than 20,000 pounds collected, a 6,000 pound increase over the 2017 total.  The pasta goes to local food banks and other nonprofit groups, distributing the food for those in need.

“PastaBowl provides students with an opportunity to give back by donating pasta at their school and helping stock the shelves of Fishers-area food banks, while raising awareness about food insecurities,” said long-time organizer and HSE School Board member John DeLucia. “We are thrilled that HSE Schools combined to set a new record donation this year.”

Here are the winners in the 2018 Pasta Bowl competition among HSE Schools:

Intermediate Winner and Overall Winner – Riverside Intermediate: 2,789 pounds
Elementary Winner – Hoosier Road Elementary: 2,369 pounds
High School Winner – Fishers High School: 2,096 pounds

NEW CATEGORY “Most Improved” – Cumberland Road Elementary: 2,166 pounds, up from 275 pounds in 2017 (+1,891)