Here is the third installment in my March series of mini-podcasts featuring personal stories tied to Disability Awareness Month

The new Spark!Fishers summer festival is continuing its work and is now to the point where the organizers are soliciting units and floats for the parade and vendors for the planned street fair.

You will find various ways to become involved with the event at this link.

If your business or organization is interested in participating in the Spark!Fishers parade, check out this link.

If you have any interest in being a part of the street fair, use this link.

The inaugural Spark!Fishers Festival is slated for Friday, June 29th and Saturday, June 30th.

The celebration will be centered in the downtown Fishers Nickel Plate District.

One thing about being retired is being able to take trips to Florida in February.  Another thing is when you wife is also retired and you can go together to Florida in February.  When your adult daughters are able to join, and you can visit relatives as well as attend a family wedding on Amelia Island, you know that trip was a good one.  And it was.

When you are away from home for a period of time, you miss a few things.  I have attempted to stay connected with Fishers while away.  But something has happened since my return and it is a sad development.

My daughter Allison is a graduate of Anderson University, so for four years I visited the city of Anderson more often than I had before.  One thing you see is the remnants of what had once been a thriving city booming economically with a large General Motors presence and is still recovering from the huge auto maker’s decision to leave Anderson many years ago.

I found retirees with UAW union shirts talking at lunch about the past and the sad state of Anderson now.  I know the city is trying very hard to recover, and they have had some success in attracting jobs and development but its’s a tall hill to climb.

Then I got the news that the Mounds Mall will be closing and it hit me that this will be just another punch in the gut to Anderson.  If you have visited the mall lately, you could see it has not been doing well and has been further victimized by the general downturn in the brick-and-mortar stores & shopping malls.

I feel for those impacted by the closing of the Mounds Mall.  But I started to think about a comment made by Senator Joe Donnelly when appearing in Fishers several months ago to receive a national award from the Chamber of Commerce.

Donnelly told the crowd that Anderson has benefited by the rapid growth of Fishers.  People unable to find work in Anderson are apparently finding employment in Fishers and commuting from Anderson to Fishers, according to the senator.

So, even though things are tough at home, some Anderson residents are remaining in their home town and commuting to jobs in Fishers.  What would have ever imagined Anderson could get a boost from Fishers?

We are not in spring season year and the month of March is just underway, but road construction is already busy throughout the city and its environs…..here’s the list for the work week starting Monday, March 5th, as provided by the City of Fishers:

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Eastbound 116th Street between Charleston Crossing and Maple Drive will be restricted to one lane on Thursday, March 8. Arrow boards will be in place to direct traffic.

106TH STREET   

106th Street is closed to through traffic from Allisonville Road to Hague Road for the 106th Street Infrastructure project.

131ST STREET   

Periodic lane restrictions will occur at the intersection of 131st Street and Cumberland Road as utility relocation work is completed.

Expect lane restrictions, weather permitting, along 131st Street between Allisonville Road and Lantern Road to allow for tree clearing prior to the construction of the Conner Trail from Conner Prairie to the Municipal Complex. Lane restrictions will also take place on Lantern Road between 131st Street and Municipal Drive.

136TH STREET   

Lane restrictions will be in place, weather permitting, along 136th Street between Southeastern Parkway and Prairie Baptist Road beginning the week of Monday, February 26, to allow for tree clearing prior to the construction of a new roundabout.

MEADOWS DRIVE   

Meadows Drive is closed between Frances Drive and Morgan Drive, weather permitting, for the installation of sanitary sewer.

ELLER ROAD   

Eller Road is closed to through traffic south of 106th Street. Also, the intersection of 106th Street and Eller Road will be closed for 2 to 3 weeks for the 106th Street Infrastructure project.

MAPLE STREET   

Lane restrictions will occur just north of 116th Street for storm sewer installation (weather permitting).

126TH STREET   

Expect possible lane restrictions on 126th Street from Allisonville Road to the railroad tracks while aerial utility work is completed.

ALLISONVILLE ROAD RESURFACING & INTERSECTION IMPROVEMENTS PROJECT  

Lane restrictions will be in place, as weather permits, along Allisonville Road from 126th Street to 131st Street for tree clearing ahead of the start of the roadway expansion project. Restrictions will be in place between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. and flaggers will be on site directing traffic, as necessary. For more info on this project, view the Fact Sheet.

MORGAN DRIVE   

Morgan Drive is restricted to one lane between Lantern Road and Emmanual Court for work on stormwater structures.

106TH STREET   

Expect lane restrictions at the 106th Street and Crosspoint/Lantern Road roundabout as utility work is completed.

The westbound lane of 106th Street (just east of Allisonville Road) will be closed until utilities are located. Westbound traffic on 106th Street will be forced to turn north.

I-69   

As part of a $92 million design-build contract, Milestone has added a third lane in each direction to the median, repaired and resurfaced existing pavement, and rehabilitated bridges and drainage structures on 15 miles of I-69 in Hamilton and Madison counties. Construction of an additional auxiliary lane between the 116th Street entrance ramp to I-69 South and the I-69 South Exit 204 ramp to 106th Street will continue through next spring.

I-69 South will be temporarily reduced to two lanes to allow space for the State Road 37 and 116th Street entrance ramps to safely merge while construction continues on the southbound auxiliary lane between the 116th Street and 106th Street ramps.

Questions about this project should be directed to INDOT via email or at 1-855-463-6848.

STATE ROAD 37  

The Meeting Minutes and Meeting Presentation from the December State Road 37 Project Public Meeting, along with additional project information is available.

The State Road 37 improvement project is a $124 million joint project between Fishers, Hamilton County, Noblesville, and INDOT. Questions or concerns may be directed via email to Drive Fishers.

As part of Disability Awareness Month, I have partnered with local groups to produce a series of podcasts where local people tell their stories.  Here is the second installment in that series:

March is Disability Awareness Month, and I will be featuring a series of mini-podcasts with local people telling their stories about dealing with disabilities. The first mini-podcast features Fishers Mayor Scott Fadness

Hamilton County Reporter

Hamilton Southeastern’s Amaya Hamilton is one of 24 players that have been
selected for the IndyStar Indiana girls Junior All-Stars for 2018.

Hamilton is in the Central group, which also includes Jordyn Barga of Monroe
Central, Cyndi Dodd of Warren Central, Carissa Garcia of Fort Wayne Concordia,
Sylare Starks of Homestead and Cameron Tabor of New Castle.

Players in the core group include Jorie Allen of Bedford North Lawrence, Shaila
Beeler of Warren Central, Rikki Harris of North Central, Lilly Hatton of North
Harrison, Maddie Nolan of Zionsville and Hannah Noveroske of Michigan City.

The North group players are Sydney Freeman of Central Noble, Tai-Yanna
Jackson of East Chicago Central, Morgan Litwiller of Northridge, Riley Ott of LaPorte
and Emma and Sophia Nolan of Marquette Catholic.

The South group players are Addy Blackwell of Bloomington South, Trinity
Brady of Lawrence North, Savaya Brockington of North Central, Kinnidy
Garrard of Pike, Makinzi Meurer of North Knox and Grace Waggoner of Vincennes
Rivet.

The coaches for the Junior All-Stars have not yet been announced.

The Junior All-Stars will play two games against the Kentucky Junior All-Stars
on June 1 and June 2 at sites to be announced. The Junior All-Stars also will
play one game against the Indiana All-Star senior girls on June 6, also at a site to be
announced. All three games will be doubleheaders with the 2018 Indiana boys
Junior All-Stars, who will be chosen during March.

The players listed as core group players will play in all three games. The players
listed as South group will join the Core group and play against the Kentucky Juniors
in Kentucky (on June 1). The Central group and North group also will join the Core
group and play one time each — either against Kentucky Juniors in Indiana
(on June 2) or against the Indiana Seniors (on June 6). The night and opponent for the Central and North groups will be determined later.

The Indiana senior All-Stars will play the Kentucky senior All-Stars on June 8 at
a site in Kentucky that has not yet been announced. The Indiana senior All-Stars
will play Kentucky’s seniors again on June 9 in Bankers Life Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.

The Junior All-Star team is determined by the 20-member Indiana Basketball Coaches Association all-state panel in conjunction with its selection of the IBCA/Subway Underclass All-State Team. The selection process allows all IBCA-member head coaches to nominate players through the IBCA all-state process. Representatives from 16 regional areas from across the state, three district representatives from the three IHSAA districts (one each from District 1,
District 2 and District 3) and the committee chair then meet to review the
nominations, vote and finalize the selections.

The IBCA/Subway girls basketball Senior All-State and Underclass All-State teams for 2018 will be released later this week.

Tridien Medical in Fishers is set for layoffs.  According to a story on the Indianapolis Business Journal (IBJ) Web site, those facing job loss could be as many as 80.

You can read John Russell’s story at this link.

The Havana Lounge will take up some prime retail space at The Yard culinary project, according to developer Thompson Thrift.  The cigar and cocktail lounge will be located next to the 1933 Lounge by St. Elmo and be adjacent to Sun King Brewery and the culinary incubator space.

Those four tenants will form the anchors for the public Greenspace area of The Yard.

“The upscale cigar and cocktail lounge will be built with urban-industrial inspired materials, comfortable furnishings and lavish appointments in décor and privacy,” according to the Owner and President of Havana Lounge Inc. Omar Barham

Havana Lounge will feature more than 4,700 square feet of total space, an outdoor
patio, a 12-foot ceiling and what the owner describes as a state of the art ventilation system.

According to Thompson Thrift, The Yard will include 252 luxury apartment homes, roughly 120,000 square feet of retail, two hotel concepts and a three-story podium-style parking garage.

The Yard will be located in the same general area near 116th Street and I-69, near IKEA and TopGolf.

When I was a junior in high school, a surprise was usually a pop quiz or new assignment I didn’t want from one of my least favorite teachers.  But two Fishers High School students received a very nice Monday morning surprise when they were presented with the announcement as winners of a statewide screenwriting competition for students in grades 9-12.

Co-writers Whitney Roberts and Cynthia Foulke accepted the honor from Pigasus Pictures,  a Bloomington, Indiana based film company, for their screenplay, “As We Begin.”

“We chose this screenplay because it has a compelling story and real heart,” said Pigasus Pictures co-founder and COO John Armstrong. “It addresses the fears that high school students have as they begin to think about life after school and the effect it will have on their relationships. The humor of dialogue was also very real and natural, which is hard to generate. It was also apparent in the pitch video that these girls had a great friendship and would be really fun to work with.”

“As We Begin,” set in Fishers, Ind., follows the story of 17-year-old Jordan Smith and her best friend, 18-year-old Dakota Hawkins, through the navigation of family-related issues, preparation for college and angst about the future. The film will be fully produced by a professional film crew and area students will be invited to apprentice on set, learning every aspect of professional film-making. The film will be submitted for consideration to major film festivals nationwide, and screened in select theaters and distributed online.

“The purpose of Project Pigasus is to find those students who were just like us,” said Pigasus Pictures CEO and co-founder Zachary Spicer. “Growing up in Indiana, you often feel so far removed from the film industry. We want to show young people that you don’t have to be from a coast, or move to one, to be able to work in this field. And, by producing this short film entirely in-state, our hope is that Project Pigasus will inspire young Hoosier filmmakers, provide opportunities for in-state talent, and generate greater exposure for Indiana’s growing film industry.”

One of Pigasus’ recent movies, filmed in Bloomington, “The Good Catholic”, is streaming now on Netflix.

The 2017 Project Pigasus winner was “Through the Window,” written by Kira Daniels of Southwestern High School in Madison, Indiana.  You can view that film at this link.