The full Fishers City Council had its first look at a proposal from the task force charged with recommending changes to the council’s process for forming its own committees and appointing people to boards and commissions.

The task force is chaired by Council President Selina Stoller, with other members John Weingardt, Cecilia Coble and Crystal Newmann.  The new document, heard at first reading  Monday night, calls for minority representation on council committees, but allows the council president to make the final decision on appointments.  Currently, the full council votes on those appointments.

The sole task force Democrat, Crystal Neumann, voiced disappointment in the recommendation, which she says “does not speak to me and it does not speak for me.”  She supports minority representation on council committees, but believes having the council president have the final say on appointments will hurt diversity efforts. “Diversity is important to Fishers because we are a growing city,” Neumann said.

Neumann also called for more collaboration among task force members.  She says the group has had only one in-person meeting.

Democrat Jocelyn Vare said this proposal would put appointment decisions behind closed doors, rather than subject to a public council vote.

Council President Stoller responded, pointing out the task force looked at other cities, such as Indianapolis and Carmel, to put together this proposal.  Stoller  addressed the issue of diversity.

“I am going to promote diversity within the community,” said Stoller.  “I feel we are a very diverse community.  We do need that representation and that representation should be moved forward.”

Councilman Pete Peterson was critical of the provision taking away the council vote on appointments and giving that authority to the council president.  He called the task force document ”unnecessary, it’s more government, it gets in the way.”

Todd Zimmerman said the the council debate may look uncomfortable, but urged the council not to abandon the task force work but move forward in an effort to find the right language.

The task force proposal has received first reading, which is the first procedural hurdle and needs only one vote.  With divisions on the council over this proposal, the question now is –  where does the task force go from here?

The Fishers City Council gave final unanimous approval to the 2022 calendar year budget Monday night, but first addressed concerns from residents in the River Glen neighborhood.

The 2022 city spending plan totals $121.64 million, with $40 million to be stashed in cash reserves, about $10 million more in reserve than guidelines require.

Deputy Mayor Elliott Hultgren presented the budget Monday night.  According to Hultgren, Mayor Scott Fadness was out of town Monday working on a “substantial economic development opportunity.”  He did not provide any further details.

Residents of River Glen had discovered in recent days that the city was planning to spend $300,000 transforming the current tennis court at River Glen into several Pickleball courts.  About 4 homeowners with property adjacent to the current tennis facility objected to the noise that would be created with a number of pickleball courts.

Hultgren addressed that concern immediately in his budget presentation, saying the proposed pickleball courts would be located on the west side of the city, not necessarily at River Glen.  The decision on an exact location of the pickleball facility would be done at a later date.

The council also unanimously approved the 2022 salary ordinance, providing a 4% pay increase for all city employees, including elected officials.

I write this on Sunday evening, October 10.  On October 11, Fishers City Councilman David George will attend his final meeting as a council member.  He plans to resign his seat.  Councilor George has the most seniority on the council, going back to the days when Fishers was a town and governed by a 7-member town council.

Mr. George’s replacement on the council, to serve for the remainder of his term, which runs through December 31, 2023, will be chosen by a process spelled-out in Indiana state law.  The Republican precinct officials within his district will vote on the new council member to represent the Southwest Council District.  Mr. George also serves as council vice-president, so it would be assumed the council will vote on which council member will fill the position of  vice president for the remainder of 2021.

The Indianapolis Star published an extensive and well-documented story in the Sunday, October 10 print edition, analyzing Indiana’s unusual system of replacing elected officials when an office becomes open during a term.  It tells the story of how Victoria Spartz jump-started her political career in a Republican precinct caucus when State Senator Luke Kenley resigned his seat.  Spartz was selected by the caucus to serve the remainder of Kenley’s term in the General Assembly, which led to a successful campaign for her current position as a member of the United States House of Representatives.

Two excellent Star reporters, Amelia Pak-Harvey and Kaitlin Lange, do a deep dive on how the Indiana system works to replace vacancies for elective office, with the good and not so good aspects of using that system.  You can read the article at this link.  You will need a subscription to the IndyStar in order to access this story.  I have written this before, and I will write it again, please subscribe to your local media!  An initial online subscription to the Star is as little as $1 for the first few months.

The calendar may say fall, but road construction season has not let-up in and around
Fishers.

There are several road projects underway and coming, so take a moment to review the latest update, as provided by the City of Fishers:

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A Fishers City Council “Committee Taskforce” will present its proposal at the Monday, October 11, council session, but Council Member At-Large Jocelyn Vare says she does not support changes in the process for council appointments to boards and commissions.

The language to be presented to the full council says all council members may “indicate a preference” as to whom should be appointed to various boards and commissions, but the decision will be made each year after the council votes on a new president in January.  The council president would be empowered to make those appointments each year, under the proposed language.  The council president would also have the authority to make appointments when there are board and commission vacancies during the year.

“…the City Council president will make all assignments at their discretion, behind closed doors.” Vare says in a statement about the proposed changes.  “This is an even worse idea than the current process. Instead of making the appointment process more organized, thoughtful, and transparent, the…Committee’s best idea is to leave these important appointments up to the whim of one person. I do not support this.”

In the past, the full council voted on a list of appointments.

In January of 2021, Councilor Vare expressed her view that the council’s appointments to boards and commissions lacked diversity, citing data showing 80% of the council appointments are white males.  Vare describes the current council appointment system as  ” haphazard, not transparent, and diversity is not a priority.”

Vare calls the proposed changes in the council appointment system “an even worse idea than the current process.”

The City Council is scheduled to consider the committee’s proposal October 11th on first reading.

The state of Indiana has put $500 million on the table and invited regions within the state submitting proposals to use a part of that money, called READI grants. the Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC) has been tasked with setting up a system for evaluating the 17 regions submitting requests.  Those requests would total about $1 billion, so all regions will not receive all the money they want.

READI stands for “Indiana Regional Economic Acceleration and Development Initiative.”

One of the 17 requests includes a region consisting of Hamilton, Madison and Marion Counties.  Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness has been heavily involved in the submission, centered on developing areas along the White River.

The IEDC announced the names of those deciding which regions will share in the $500 million and how much each will be awarded.  The READI Review Committee consists of the following members:

• Bill Hanna, Executive Director, Dean and Barbra White Family Foundation
• Isaac Bamgbose, President and CEO of New City Development
• Jason Dudich, Vice President for Finance and Administration, Treasurer, University of Indianapolis
• Jason Blume, Executive Director, Innovation One
• Kelli Jones, Co-Founder and General Partner, Sixty8 Capital
• Leah Curry, President, Toyota Motor Manufacturing Indiana
• Lori Luther, Chief Operating Officer, IU Health Ball Memorial Hospital

The IEDC is expected to announce the awards by the end of 2021.

The Fishers City Council formed a “Committee Taskforce,” what some described as a “committee on committees,” in June of this year. The group, consisting of city council members and chaired by Council President Selina Stoller, was assisted by City Attorney Chris Greisl.  The goal was to formalize the council’s committee system.

At the October 11 council session, the Committee Taskforce will unveil its proposal to the full council.  It calls for two standing committees – Budget & Finance Committee and Rules Committee.  The council has had a standing finance committee for several years, but the proposed ordinance would formalize that panel.

The ordinance would call for a minimum of 3 members for each standing committee.  Each panel would have at least one member of the minority party.  Two of the nine council members are Democrats.  Crystal Neumann, a Democrat, serves on the Committee Taskforce.

According to the proposed ordinance, the Rules Committee will have the authority to consider and recommend proposed changes for the rules of the Common Council, State and Federal legislation, and any other matter properly referred to the committee by the Council President.

Each committee would vote on a recommendation, then the issue would go before the entire council for final action.

Appointments to the standing committees would be made by the council president following the first meeting each January.  A majority of committee members must be present for a quorum in order to conduct business.

The city council appoints members to various boards and commissions, and the proposed ordinance deals with that issue with the following language:

“Council members may indicate their preference for appointments to the Council President for any non-standing council committee, board, or commission where council
memberships or council appointments on the board or commission is required by Indiana
law or local ordinance. All annual appointments shall be made after the January Council
meeting in which the Council President is elected, and all council and citizen appointments shall be deemed final upon assignment by the Council President. The Council President may fill any board or commission vacancy at any time.”

The full council will have a first reading of the ordinance October 11, and two more readings would be required before final passage, short of a unanimous vote to suspend the rules.

Future plans for building and grounds maintenance for Hamilton Southeastern (HSE) schools was the focus of a Wednesday evening school board work session.  One issue at the center of the plans is the future of Fishers Elementary School.

Fishers Elementary, located at 11442 Lantern Road, sets on 8 acres of land.  All other HSE elementary schools have 20 acres.  The school is just south of downtown Fishers, where there has been a great deal of commercial and residential development.

$12 million is the estimated cost of maintenance needed at Fishers Elementary in 2023.  School Superintendent Yvonne Stokes says the board needs to discuss the future of the school.

“The question is, do we put that kind of money into the building?” said Stokes.  “It’s landlocked in terms of space to build or add on to it.  If a decision was made to rebuild, where would we rebuild?”

Lantern Road Elementary is due for a $14 million maintenance program in 2022, but that could be impacted by any decision made on Fishers Elementary.

Facilities Director for HSE Schools, Harry Delks, went over all the plans for maintenance projects up through the year 2033.  Katy Dowling, Chief Financial Officer for HSE Schools, told the board all maintenance funding  plans are based on holding the current property tax rate for debt at .5898, the same rate HSE Schools have had since 2013.

No decisions were made at the work session.

The students at Durbin Elementary School will be headed to the new Deer Creek Elementary starting in August of 2022.  Durbin will undergo a $2 million – $2.2 million renovation project beginning in May of 2022 and expected to be completed by October of 2022.  Durbin is to house the Focus program, now in Fall Creek Junior High…The Transitions program, moving from both high schools….and the Academy, moving from space the school district currently leases.

For a more detailed look at the maintenance plan presented to the school board, use this link.   

The number of new COVID cases locally are flattening.  That’s the word from Josh Robinson, Fishers Health Department epidemiologist, in has latest video update posted late Tuesday.

Hamilton County has seen a decrease in the unique positivity rate –  13.3% last week and down to to 11.8% this week.

There has been a decrease in the local case incidence rate in the past 2 weeks, from  33.47 down to 29.76

However, there has been a slight uptick in the positivity rate at Fishers testing site, from  7 up to 10 this past week.

Overall, Fishers is seeing the same number of new COVID cases in latest 7-day lookback period, compared to the previous week…2 weeks ago 190 cases, 198 in most recent period.

“We are in this downward trend on some important primary metric areas,” says Robinson.

Hospitals in the local Fishers area are seeing an increase in the number of Intensive Care Unit beds and an overall flattening of hospital bed availability.

According to Robinson, local residents not already vaccinated should do so.

“We are continuing to see quite a disparity in the relative risk of infection for those that are unvaccinated compared to those that have received their vaccine,” Robinson says.

Anyone with COVID questions should contact the local hotline, 317-595-3211.

In other COVID-related news, the Hamilton County Health Department is reopening its mass vaccination clinic at the 4H Fairgrounds in Noblesville on Wednesday, October 6th. Hours will be 1:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. on Mondays and Wednesdays and 9:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays. Only those who are 65 years of age or older as well as those who are 18 years and older with underlying medical conditions or who live or work in high-risk settings are eligible for a Pfizer booster. Walk-ups are welcome, but appointments are preferred.

The Fishers Health Department mass vaccination site remains open.  Find more information at this link.

It appears Fishers will lose a downtown restaurant that has been there for 6.5 years, citing a lack of staff as the reason.  Pure Eatery, located in a strip mall on the south side of 116th Street, just west of the municipal complex, says the bar only will be open 2pm-6pm Thursday, October 7, so local patrons can say goodbye.

“This community welcomed us in 2015 when you didn’t know who or what we were,” Pure Eatery posted on their Facebook page. “We had a dream of bringing fresh, honest food, and local artwork in a space that welcomes all; to gather, eat, drink, and celebrate life. We’ve been so lucky to share our guests’ triumphs, celebrate birthdays and anniversaries, and provide a place to gather for life’s milestones.”

The post also praises their staff members.  “They have carried us thru the good, the bad, and now the ugly times and we cannot say thank you enough.”

There continues to be a Pure Eatery location in the Fountain Square area of Indianapolis.