Tag: wayne_county

The end of Progressive Wayne County

screenshotIn September of 2006 I announced the launch of ProgressiveWayneCounty.org, a website dedicated to   promoting and chronicling the progressive efforts of individuals, organizations and businesses in the Wayne County, Indiana area.

I'm shutting the site down here in April of 2013 for a couple of reasons:

For one, it's been over a year since the last content update to the site.  Some of the old content has even become confusing to users looking for recent versions of past events.  Over the years I've tried various methods for keeping the site up to date and current: trying to post a lot of stuff myself, soliciting area organizations to post content, asking volunteer editors to write posts, paying people to write for the site, and others.  That's not to say that there weren't times when the site was chock full of useful info, but just not in a sustainable way.

Continue reading "The end of Progressive Wayne County" →

8 ways for the Wayne County Democratic Party to be more effective

Capitol Dome'Tis the season for political reckonings.  As the national Republican Party performs a messy post-mortem on its failed strategy to get Mitt Romney elected President, the Democratic Party in Indiana is also asking itself what it needs to do to be more effective.  The Indianapolis Star says that "Indiana Democrats have plunged to their lowest level of power in decades after Tuesday's election."

This week the Palladium-Item's editorial page rightly took the local Wayne County Democratic Party to task for being too quiet and minimally effective in local politics. (I am on the P-I editorial advisory board but I did not contribute to that piece.)  Today's edition features some analysis of the local party's current leadership, with about the amount of internal finger pointing you'd expect from an organization in some disarray.  It's the candidates! It's the leadership! It's the unions! We just need to get on Twitter!  And so on.

I've followed local politics for a while now, perhaps never so closely as last year when I was a candidate myself running on the Democratic ticket.  It was an eye-opening experience in many ways, including discovering first-hand the significant organizational deficiencies in the Wayne County Democratic Party (and how well-organized the local Republican Party is, due in no small part to the tireless efforts of its Chairwoman, Misty Hollis).  Unfortunately, I've seen some of those deficiencies come into play again in this year's campaigning.

Continue reading "8 ways for the Wayne County Democratic Party to be more effective" →

2012 Chamber Debate Bingo Cards

Tonight at 6 PM, the Wayne County Area Chamber of Commerce will be hosting a series of debates for candidates in various local, county and state races.   The debate is free and open to the public, and will take place at Vivian Auditorium on the IU East campus.  You can also watch the debates live on WCTV.

I hope local voters will watch the debates to learn more about the would-be elected officials who might significantly influence how tax dollars are spent, government is run, and children are educated.

But if you need another reason to watch, you can now download and print out my Chamber Debate Bingo Cards [PDF].

Each time a candidate says a phrase on the card, you mark off that square.  Get five in a row, and you've got a BINGO! (If you are attending the debates in person, please do not yell out "BINGO" during a debate session.)

Each of the 5 cards has a random ordering of phrases, so you can play against your friends and family.

Local elections have never been so fun!  Enjoy.

I'll pay you to help improve local public discourse

A few weeks ago, one of the online community resources I maintain, ProgressiveWayneCounty.org, soft-launched a new program where we're paying local community members to blog for the site.   During that time, we've already had some great contributions with reflections on affordable housing, national politics, over-simplifying our choices in the world, some heartfelt advice on caring for pet dogs, and what the life of Richmondite Esther Griffin White can teach us about how we plan for the future.  (Thank you to Matthew Jenkins, Aaron Nell, Cassie Oaks, Robert Hertzog and Anne Thomason for serving as the pioneer contributors and testing out the publishing system!)

Today, I'm happy to publicly invite others in Richmond and Wayne County to join in this effort to raise the level of public discourse in our area.  Whether it's commentary on the local arts scene, restaurant reviews, political news analysis, your experiences with religion and spirituality, technology tools, sustainability tips or perspectives on education, we welcome contributions from those who feel they can provide a local connection and provoke conversation that might help move the community forward in some form.

Continue reading "I'll pay you to help improve local public discourse" →

The closing of Really Cool Foods

Groundbreaking for Really Cool FoodsIn 2007, organic prepared food producer Really Cool Foods announced that it would be building a multi-plant production complex in Cambridge City, Indiana and investing over $100 million in the area.  The announcement was met with great joy and significant incentives from state and local governments:

The Indiana Economic Development Corp. offered Really Cool Foods up to $3.05 million in performance-based tax credits, up to $165,000 in training grants and will provide Cambridge City officials with a $200,000 grant to assist in off-site infrastructure improvements needed for the project. Wayne County officials offered the company 50 acres of land, $165,000 in grants and a 10-year property tax abatement.

The facility opened in October of 2008 with 250 of the projected 1,000 jobs to start, and over the last few years the company has had numerous challenges reaching initially estimated milestones of investment and jobs created.

Today, the company told workers who showed up for their morning shift that the facility was closing, and in a press release sent after 9 AM, announced the company is shutting down.

A couple of initial thoughts and questions about this unfortunate announcement:

Continue reading "The closing of Really Cool Foods" →

On the Wheel Tax in Wayne County Indiana

The Commissioners of Wayne County, Indiana are currently evaluating whether or not to institute a wheel tax (formally known as a "Local Option Highway User Tax"), as allowed for by Indiana's General Assembly since 1980.  It would charge an annual fee to residents registering vehicles in the County, $25 for cars and other small vehicles, $40 for large trucks, RVs, buses, etc.  A few thoughts on this proposal and how we got here:

First, the tax is being presented by the Commissioners as a suddenly urgent need for the area, "act before it's too late," they say.  I find this characterization troubling given that one of the fundamental truths of life is that roads will deteriorate over time and will require money be spent on them if we want to keep them fixed up.  If our ability to maintain infrastructure comes down to whether or not we can urgently get the public to approve additional taxation once in a while, then we're doing it wrong. Where was the long-term planning and well-thought-out discussion that would give the community time to react to this significant problem in our county and explore alternatives?

Continue reading "On the Wheel Tax in Wayne County Indiana" →

EDC Board Appointments: Ready for Battle!

If you read today's Palladium-Item article detailing the recent attempts by Richmond's City Council to gain more representation on the Economic Development Corporation's board of directors, you might be a little confused. I certainly was.

On one hand, you've got the City painting a picture of being left out of the key parts of the relationship the EDC has with its Richmond constituents, having to fork over $730,000 without appropriate representation.

You've got a County official noting that the City is as well represented on the EDC board as the County or other entities, and that things are working just fine as they are, while the Chamber president notes that there may be a conversation to be had, but that the current actions being taken are too poorly timed.

What's going on here?  Everyone seems to be making reasonable statements on the matter that represents the point of view of the entities they serve, but it sounds like they're having the conversation with each other for the first time on the pages of the newspaper. ARGH!

Continue reading "EDC Board Appointments: Ready for Battle!" →

Too many community builders in one town?

GazeboOne of the recurring themes in my writing in speaking about how to make our communities more self-reliant is that we can't necessarily depend on entities and organizations that aren't locally rooted to address the issues that are of local concern. The natural corollary to this is that, in addition to individual citizens taking action, we should be able to look to locally rooted organizations to be moving the community forward, helping us make it the place we want it to be.

But one only has to look at the long list of community building organizations and entities in Richmond - and the overlap, duplication, and even competition that some of them represent for each other - to wonder if maybe this isn't an area where we're actually holding ourselves back instead of moving ourselves forward.

Consider, in no particular order: Continue reading "Too many community builders in one town?" →

Links for the Week - Election Day Roundup

Election Day Roundup:

  1. The Results Are In: Four more years for Sally Hutton and Karen Chasteen, a bit of a shakeup on the City's Common Council, and a 27% voter turnout - bleh, but not so bleh as last time.
  2. Voting, a blog entry: Scenes and thoughts from one voter's experience
  3. Pal-Item endorses Hutton, Thalls erases blog entries: most voters were probably thinking of the critical need to observe good blogging etiquette when they cast their vote today...
  4. Meet the new Mayor of Indianapolis, Greg Ballard: Greg Ballard, the Republican who pulled off one of the biggest political upsets in Indiana history, will be the next mayor of Indianapolis.
  5. Antioch College will stay open: a different kind of recent vote that affects the region. Of course, if you're the Weekly Standard, you might be a little disappointed after predicting Death by Political Correctness.

How was your Election Day?

Initial analysis of the Wayne County primary election results

IMG_2013.JPGSome initial analysis of the Wayne County primary election results:

  • Only 4,378 people voted. That's 16% of our registered voter population, 27,290, which is also woefully small. These numbers are pathetic.
  • Republican mayoral candidates: of the 2,645 people who voted, almost 80% of them picked Rick Thalls over Ron Chappell and Danny Black. Possible conclusions to be drawn...Rick Thalls had the leverage of a career in the school system and all of the lives he's touched as a part of that? Danny Black and Ron Chappell needed to do a lot more campaigning? Mr. Black didn't have enough name recognition and people remembered Mr. Chappell's lack of integrity around the City's non-discrimination policy discussion? Hmmm. Quite a landslide, anyway, and some good momentum for Mr. Thalls as he faces the incumbent in the fall.
  • Democratic mayoral candidates: Mayor Sally Hutton garners more than 82% of the vote over Mark Cordell. Cordell didn't have a very widely distributed image or platform, and so the incumbent advantage easily wins out. Still, with only 1,651 voting, it's not exactly an overflowing of political capital for the Mayor, and falls short of her fall opponent's apparent levels of support. She'll need to work hard between now and then to win.
  • Republican candidates for city council district 2: Sharon Sheets beat Joshua Jones by 8 votes, with only a total of 84 votes. With voter participation that low for a particular seat, it's sad to see such a small margin, and you can't really fault the losing candidate. Let's just hope the winner is qualified.
  • Democratic candidates for city council: way too many unopposed seats or even empty seats. Regardless of your party affiliation, you've got to appreciate the benefits of a contest when it comes to holding political leaders accountable over time. For the at-large seats, the margins were all so close that again it becomes more a matter of voter turnout and less a matter of mandate based on qualifications. Let's hope the winners can do the job.
  • The voting process: mixed results. Convenience and efficiency seemed to be the general trend, but when I asked for a paper record of my vote they still could not give me one, and when I asked to inspect the software that powered the voting machines, they still could not let me in. It's a black box voting system and we have no idea who or what could be influencing the outcome...a complete failure of transparent democracy.

    The stickers they give out when you're done should read "I've been told My Vote Counted!"

What do you think?