The Indiana General Assembly has tasked the State Board of Education (SBOE) with proposing new high school diploma standards by the end of 2024.  The SBOE has scheduled a meeting on July 30 to further discuss the graduation requirements.

State Representative Victoria Garcia Wilburn organized a meeting Monday evening at the Hamilton East Library in downtown Fishers to take questions on the issue.  She says her office has been inundated with questions and comments about the proposed new high school diploma requirements.  Representative Wilburn said at the outset this is not a political event, but one aimed at answering the public’s questions.  The public had plenty of questions.

Hamilton Southeastern School Board member Sarah Donsbach,  along with local attorney and education lobbyist Joel Hand, were part of the panel for the event.  Those in attendance wrote down questions and Hand did his best to combine questions in order to fit it all into the one-hour time limit.

The proposed changes would create GPS & GPS+ diplomas, while eliminating the Academic Honors diploma.  The plan would allow students to receive training in the work force.

The new diplomas would reduce the science requirement for graduation and eliminate classes such as Geometry and Algebra II.  Health, foreign languages and economics would be removed as requirements for the new diplomas.

Wilburn read a statement provided by Purdue University, saying the GPS and GPS+ diplomas would not be sufficient to be admitted to that institution.  Indiana University has made similar statements.

Most of the questions submitted by the public centered on how the new proposed rules would work and the impact on parents, students, teachers and counselors.

One question asked the panel what data was utilized to establish these standards.  Wilburn replied that most of the citations provided by SBOE were to Web sites.  Requests submitted by Wilburn’s staff on citations have so far not resulted in answers.

The large turnout for this discussion exemplifies the interest the public has in the new high school dipliomas.

I talked with Hamilton Southeastern Schools Deputy Superintendent Dr. Matt Kegley June 12, and he expressed his concerns about the SBOE proposal on diploma requirements.  Read his comments at this link.

With the Andretti Racing Team constructing its new headquarters in Fishers in a corner of Metropolitan Airport, near 96th Street, the Indianapolis Star is reporting another racing team, Prema, is poised to occupy a spot near the Andretti complex here in Fishers.

Nathan Brown, IndyCar reporter for the Star, reports Prema is set to compete in the IndyCar series starting next year.

You may need a subscription to the Star in order to access this story, but it is available at this link.  

It’s always good to see Fishers receiving attention in Indianapolis media outlets.  On July 21, the IndyStar published a piece on how many Hamilton County cities, such as Fishers, will soon run out of land to expand.  Now, Daniel Bradley of the Indianapolis Business Journal (IBJ) has done a deep dive into how the population of Fishers will expand due to annexation.

The area Fishers is eyeing is located in the southeast corner of Hamilton County, near the Hancock and Madison County lines, adjacent to the Town of McCordsville.

Bradley’s piece says the current population of Fishers, estimated at about 105,000, could increase to a total of 107,000 to 1009,000.  Indiana’s third-largest city by population is Evansville at 115,000.  Fishers could be poised to overtake Evansville in the not-too-distant future as the state’s third-largest city.  Indy is the state’s largest city, followed by Fort Wayne.

What about opposition from the neighborhoods about to be annexed by Fishers?  Enough homeowners are bound by remonstrance waivers that it is unlikely any opposition would be successful.

Fortville would like to annex that same area, but that would require crossing county lines.  The legal complications for Fortville to make that move across county lines makes it an unlikely probability.  Many people living in that area have Fortville mailing addresses and some thought they were already living in the Town of Fortville, although they are not.

There is plenty more detail in Daniel Bradley’s well-written piece.  You can access the IBJ story at this link, but you may need a subscription to access the piece online.  The Star story is available at this link but also may require a subscription.

Nonprofit offers new affordable housing development in Fishers

I was at the ground-breaking ceremony for the Cumberland Cottages development in June of last year.  I wrote a progress report on the construction on May 28 of this year.  Leila Kheiry of Current Publishing posted a story about the coming open house August 1st at 10:00am (see the link above).

Cumberland Cottages is an affordable housing project from Noblesville-based nonprofit HAND Incorporated.  It consists of 11 housing units.

Located in the north end of Fishers, near the border with Noblesville at 141st Street & Cumberland Road, the construction crews are putting the final touches and landscaping on the project as of this writing.

Reporter Kheiry had a tour of the property with HAND Executive Director Andrea Davis, which was part of Leila’s story posted on the Current Web site and will be in an upcoming print edition.

One thing is certain….there is a need for affordable housing in this area of Hamilton County.

It was September, 2014.  The Fishers Board of Zoning Appeals had just approved a plan to move the Kincaid House from its long-time location dating back to Fishers as a farm town, to another plot of land near I-69.  I asked the group organized to save the house what their plans were once the structure was moved.  They asked me, “Do you have any ideas?”

When you ask a reporter covering the meeting for suggestions on what to do with the old house, I knew the whole situation was in trouble.  There was no plan on what to do.

You can see the old Kincaid House, sometimes referred to as the Morris-Flanagan-Kincaid House, as you drive along I-69 north in Fishers.  Most people around Fishers just call it the Kincaid House.  Driving by you can spot the disrepair.  The house has no utility hookups and no road for easy access.

More than a year ago, I recorded a podcast with some of the relatives related to the past owners of the Kincaid House, along with Fishers PR Director Ashley Elrod.  There was still some hope for the future of the house, perhaps as the centerpiece of a roundabout.  That never happened.  You can listen to that podcast at this link.

John Tuohy of the Indianapolis Star has written a deep dive into the Kincaid House, posted to the Star Web site July 26.  You can read the article at this link, but a subscription may be required.

The Kincaid House was saved from demolition in 2014 when it was moved, very carefully and meticulously.  It now stands stranded, abandoned and in disrepair.  It is sad a part of Fishers history has ended up this way.

A normal mid-summer list of road construction in and around Fishers as July leaves us and August appears.

Below is the full listing, as provided by the City of Fishers:

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Continue reading Fishers area road construction update for the work week starting Monday, July 29 →

Perhaps it is because I began working in journalism during the mid-to-late 1970s, the post-Watergate era, that I am sometimes skeptical about certain things.  If you have been reading this blog for any amount of time, you know I have written often about ranking cities.

I do respect Money Magazine’s listing of the best places to live in America, having looked at how they do the rankings.  There is credibility there.  In 2017, Fishers was named by Money as the best place to live in America.

There are plenty of news and other organizations that have put themselves into the game of ranking cities as to their “livability.”  A Web site that specializes in such rankings, Livability.com, has just come out with new rankings and Fishers is listed as the number 4 place in the nation for livability.  By the way, our neighbor to the west, Carmel, was ranked number one.

I often do not report on most such rankings because there is no way, in my mind, to measure the most important ingredient in assessing any local community – the intangibles that do not show up in any set of measurable data points.

I do find Livability.com has a good measuring system, so that is why I am writing about this ranking.  Fishers should be happy with this high ranking nationally.

In its assessment of Fishers, Livability.com cites “affordable homes, good health care and a diverse business sector, and transportation assets include Interstate 69. The highly regarded Hamilton Southeastern School District has more than 21,000 students, and recreation attractions include Geist Reservoir, 14 parks, and 85 miles of trails and greenways.”

For more on how Livability.com measured Fishers s #4 in the nation, use this link.

The Hamilton Southeastern (HSE) School Board always has a meeting early in the month, and lists a second session in the month as optional.  The board opted not to meet in late July.

However, members of the Hamilton Southeastern Education Association (HSEA) decided to picket the school administration building as a message that the local teachers’ union is not pleased with how the current board and administration are handling relations with teachers and HSEA.

In the video linked above, HSEA President Abby Taylor tells those assembled that HSE Schools did not properly handle responses to the HSEA’s filing of an Unfair Labor Practice (ULP) which extends the time to process the action.  Taylor did say school officials claim HSEA “misinterpreted” comments by school administrators.  Taylor says the union has documented comments from school officials that are fairly clear and would be unlikely misconstrued.

The ULP alleges that the current administration has created a toxic work environment at HSE Schools.

In the video above, an official with the Columbus, Indiana, teachers’ union spoke in support of HSEA.  Also on hand for the picketing was Indiana State Teachers Association (ISTA) President Keith Gambill.

In the video linked above, Taylor deals with emergency vehicles speeding to a response on Cumberland Road, but kept on with her comments.

The recommended Fishers trash collection bid from Republic calls for a $16.39 monthly charge for residential service in 2025, and by the 10th year of the contract, the cost per month will be $26.89.

“The $26.89 amount is substantially lower than…about 50 per cent of residents are currently paying,” says Mayor Fadness’ Chief of Staff Jordin Alexander.

Think about that.  In year 10 of the Republic contract, year 2035, that rate is lower than about half of what Fishers homes are paying for residential trash collection service now.

A public hearing is set for August 13 on the recommendation from city staff to award the city-wide trash collection contract to Republic.  I do expect a large crowd and the Board of Public Works and Safety will move its meeting to the small conference room on the third floor of City Hall to the theater, with a lot of additional seats.

I was writing this blog in 2023 when the Town of Fishers first proposed a trash service for all Fishers residents.  The feedback was universally negative, basically telling Town of Fishers officials at that time they did not want the government telling them which trash service to use.

However, the cost of trash pickup in those days was much lower and there were many companies offering the service.  When WM (formerly known as Waste Management) acquired Ray’s, that left just 2 trash services currently available to residential users currently – WM & Republic.

Most of the cities surrounding Fishers already have city-wide trash collection contracts.  The increase in fees for this service has resulted in residents lobbying the city to start the process.

There are lots of details to explain.  For example, if you are a snowbird leaving Fishers for more than a month in the winter season, you can stop your service temporarily and not be charged.  There will be provisions for leaf and additional waste pickup twice a year.

The city has setup a section of their Web site dedicated just to the trash issue at this link.

I know this is a big issues with a number of people in Fishers wanting to save money on trash pickup.  I will have more on this issue as the year moves along, with the expectation the new trash collection will be in place during January of 2025.

Kevin Stumpf teachers Social Studies and Tony Sturgeon is an English teacher, both at Fishers Junior High School.  A City of Fishers Education Innovation Grant allowed the two to travel to Washington DC & Philadelphia, bringing back ideas for teachers in the Hamilton Southeastern School District.

I spoke with the teachers shortly after their return to Fishers.