Well, it’s that time again. As 2021 comes to a close, after reviewing an entire year’s worth of posts on my blog, I felt Fishers had a busy year. Then, I realized, when has Fishers not had a busy year, going back to when this news blog started in 2012?
So, once again, allow me to explain how I went about this task. After several hours of reviewing my 2021 blog posts, I wrote down what I considered to be candidates for the “most important of the year” list. Then I started the toughest job – what items stay, which ones go and how to rank the top stories.
This year, I will list 15 stories as the biggest of the year, starting with number 15 all the way up to the number 1 story of the year. As expressed in previous years, most news organizations have many meetings and plenty of verbal fist-fights about which stories should make the list and how to rank them.
For me, it is all my own doing. I have those fights in my own mind. I by no means consider this a perfect list and many of you reading will take issue with this list, and that is fine by me.
With that in mind, here we go…..Larry Lannan’s top 15 Fishers news stories for the year 2021!
15. Indiana Supreme Court case – HSE Schools vs. WTHR
Rick Wimmer may be retired as a Fishers High School football coach and teacher, but an issue with his past suspension remains an unresolved legal matter. When Mr. Wimmer’s suspension was announced, the facts revealed about the reason or reasons for that suspension were not spelled out specifically, so local television news organization WTHR partnered with a freedom-of-the-press nonprofit to challenge the Hamilton Southeastern (HSE) Schools in an effort to reveal more facts about the decision to suspend Mr. Wimmer. It all comes down to how a state statute is interpreted. The Indiana Supreme Court held a hearing on the dispute in 2021 and a decision is awaited as of this writing. One thing is for sure – the decision reached by the justices will have a wide-ranging impact on Indiana schools and local governments.
14. New Fishers City Council members
Two Fishers City Council members left the body in 2021.
Democrat Samantha DeLong moved to Las Vegas with her family and was forced to resign her seat as a result. Crystal Neumann was appointed by the Hamilton County Democratic Chair to fill the seat when a party caucus failed to muster a quorum for a vote.
David George, the longest tenured council member, decided to resign his seat in 2021. A Republican Party caucus chose David Giffel to succeed Mr. George.
13. Census number
When I would ask people with some knowledge of the situation about what the current population of Fishers might be, in recent months, I would often receive the response of somewhere around 100,000. The official 2020 census pegged that Fishers population number at 98,977, very close to the 100K mark.
12. 5G towers in Fishers neighborhoods
Verizon halted 5G tower rollouts in Fishers for several months, but the program was back in 2021. A number of local neighborhoods are seeing these towers pop-up all around them. Only a handful have been denied by the city for very narrow reasons allowed by state and federal law. Expect more towers to come before the city in 2022 as this technology moves forward.
11. Hamilton Southeastern Education Association elects a new leader
Janet Chandler has led the local teachers’ union for many years, but decided not to seek re-election this time around. Abby Taylor has taken over the presidency of the Hamilton Southeastern Education Association in 2021.
10. Thorpe Creek Elementary selected as a Blue Ribbon School
Only a handful of schools are chosen for the honor of being a Blue Ribbon School. In 2021, Hamilton Southeaster Schools had one building selected for this honor – Thorpe Creek Elementary.
9. City buys HSE Utilities area within city limits
For those of us living within the city limits of Fishers, you could have been served by one of two utility operations – Fishers or HSE Utilities. In 2021, the City of Fishers purchased the HSE Utilities service area within the city. As a result, one sewer utility will serve all Fishers residents, the city’s utility. There was no rate change in this transaction.
8. Fishers buys 98 acres along the White River
Fishers took an offer of paying back property taxes to purchase 98 acres of land along the White River, north of 96th Street. There are long-term plans to have a park and possibly other development on that land. Fishers late in the year learned that the state will provide READI grant money of $3 million – less than requested but useful. Those funds will be used on the 98 acres and on a possible roundabout at 96th Street and Allisonville Road, which currently has a “Michigan Left” for left turns.
7. HSE Schools, teachers agree to one-year contract
The aforementioned Hamilton Southeastern Education Association reached a one-year pact with the local school board, providing a 3.25% pay increase for local teachers. The parties limited the contract to one-year due to the uncertainties surrounding COVID.
6. HSE Schools approved new elementary boundaries
With Deer Creek Elementary to be opened in August, 2022, the school board approved new elementary district lines, but limited the exercise to that school and other elementary buildings in the general area, including the overcrowded Southeastern Elementary. Durbin Elementary students will be moved to the new Deer Creek building, along with some students at Southeastern Elementary, with other changes in the plan.
5. Fishers Bioscience boom
Fishers had not been known as a hotbed for the life science industry, but circumstances have lined-up and Fishers is growing in that economic sector. An Italian and South Korean firm have both announced plans to build facilities in the city and will provide some high-paying jobs as a result.
4. Warren (Butch) Harling dies
Warren Harling, known by his friends as Butch, served local government on the Fishers Plan Commission and Board of Zoning Appeals for a very long time. Mr. Harling passed away in 2021. He was succeeded as Plan Commission President by Howard Stevenson, a former Hamilton Southeastern School Board member and the first African-American to serve in that post.
3. Yvonne Stokes hired as HSE Schools Superintendent
The retirement of Superintendent Allen Bourff meant the Hamilton Southeastern (HSE) School Board was tasked with selecting a new leader for the district. The board hired Yvonne Stokes, an assistant superintendent in Munster, a school district in the northwestern part of Indiana, as the new HSE Superintendent.
2. Nickel Plate Trail and downtown development
Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness says very little keeps him up at night, but the 2021 summer closure of 116th Street in the heart of downtown Fishers had him concerned. It wasn’t easy, but the closure came and went. Work continues on the Nickel Plate Trail tunnel underneath 116th Street. That part of the trail is set to open in early 2022.
The construction along the downtown area of 116th Street is making progress, with many buildings closer to completion, including the First Internet Bank headquarters building.
The number one news story in Fishers for 2021:
COVID
This should come as no surprise. The HSE Schools went through hybrid class schedules to keep students and staff safe, but with some classes virtual and other days in-person, it was a tough time for both teachers and students. The fall 2021 semester began with students in-person but with a mask-wearing requirement.
Fishers remodeled an abandoned Marsh grocery on 116th Street, just east of Brooks School Road, and established a COVID vaccination center, which remains in operation as we enter 2022.
Every time COVID appears to be coming under control, something happens, such as a new variant, and the virus explodes once again.
Mayor Fadness is quite proud that roughly 88% of Fishers adults have had at least one COVID shot.
Fishers, the city, local schools and local residents all tried to deal with COVID in 2021. We can only hope and pray that 2022 will be a better COVID year for Fishers and all of us.