and welcome to Cats Week. I'm Annalise Poorman. The Bloomington City Council met on February 18th. During
public comment, local residents urged the council to consider cutting the city's contract with Flock
Safety, a surveillance company that has been utilized by immigration and customs enforcement. One resident,
Sam, says he wants the council to ban Flock altogether. I just think we need to go a lot further because this
is a threat to our lives when you think about who can use it. I do not believe the mayor's line that
this is a purpose-driven limited use tool, because by definition is a general surveillance network.
The data is live-streamed, the cameras are independently powered and networked, the public does not
own the data, the public cannot access the data. We don't know who can get it, and it's been shown being
used in terrible ways. So I would ask you, council,
to go a step further and create an ordinance to ban the use of FLOC and similar fascist technologies
and help stand up for citizens here. I know the current contracts have terms in them that you can't
necessarily touch, but you can ban future use beyond those contracts, and it takes an ordinance from
council. So please consider that. Thank you for your time. And that's your time. Thank you so much.
Another resident Seaforth Breeze says that they live down the road from where a flock camera is installed.
Breeze says that they believe flock is not accountable to the public. My name is Seaforth Breeze. I've
been a resident in Bloomington for a little over a decade now at this stage. I wish to speak about flock
cameras. I'll keep my comment pretty brief. The residence that I'm currently staying at, it's a rental.
is directly in the line of sight just down a hill from one of the cameras. Every single day, when I
cycle to work, when I get in my car, all hours, even when I'm on my patio, the camera is staring right
down at me. To bring back one of the earlier public comments, these companies
and it's not just flock but expanding beyond that to the security apparatus that is represented by these
companies, they are not accountable to the public in a meaningful way. They have been demonstrated on
numerous occasions now in cities as far-flung as like California, for example, to have ignored requests
from the municipalities that they contract with to keep the data contained to that municipality.
You know, I'm relatively young. I'm around 30ish and like seeing the expansion of this technology into
every part of my life, into every venue from my workplace, when I'm driving down the street, when I'm
going into the shops, when I am, I mean just everywhere. It is a
tech solution that does not have a horizon. And it justifies, you know, it's a response that is not
solving things. It is retroactively putting Band-Aids on more structural concerns and needs. Community
member Moby Jean Glazer also urged the council to cancel its contract with Flock.
I want to encourage all members of council to take every possible action available to them to end the
current contract with FLOC and to prevent any future contracts from being made. Right now we
need preventative and proactive measures taken to ensure the safety of our community members. In a recent
town hall, I asked Mayor Thompson about FLOC surveillance and its benefit risks to our community. And
she said she did not believe this technology is surveilling our community.
However, myself and many others strongly disagree with her. She spoke to the contract itself as a means
of creating safety and preventing abuse. Many folks feel we cannot trust Flock to keep our community
safe and believe there's too much potential for those in power to harm our community. This is informed
by what we are seeing nationally in regards to Flock data being used against protesters, by ICE to harm
community members, by a police officer to stalk a former partner,
by police officers to track community members accessing reproductive health care in other states. And
these are just a few documented examples. Considering the violent and oppressive nature of our current
federal and state governments and the legislation we are seeing proposed especially at the state level,
the safest thing we can do locally in regards to FLOC is to end the contract and remove FLOC
from our community. Councilmember Isak Asari introduced a draft resolution that addressed automated
license plate readers. According to a letter that he sent to the council, the resolution pauses further
expansion of FLOC systems and other automated license plate readers. Asari calls it, quote,
a first step, unquote, toward curbing the city's affiliation with FLOC.
The Monroe County Public Library Board of Trustees met on February 18th. In his monthly report, Library
Director Greer Carson updated the board on their partnership with Health Net, a health care and support
service organization.
Our partnership with Health Net resumed in January. You may recall a couple of years ago we started
that partnership when we had some folks from Health Net come and speak to you all about what
their partnership and what their work is all about. That started in January after a brief hiatus. We're
glad to be able to work with the group again. They provide space and opportunities to support patrons
who are experiencing homelessness, who have some basic health needs, and they provide referrals to those
folks for more serious needs.
General Manager of Community Access Television Services, Martin O'Neill, reviewed the CATS annual contracts
with the board. Four contracts this evening, one from the city, the county, town of Ellisville, and
a memorandum of understanding with WFHB. The city contract is a one percent increase over last year,
county is a three percent increase, Ellisville is a two percent, and our agreement with WFHB that
That is the continuation of our weekly government roundup show called Cats Week that we do every Friday.
And that's basically it. The Cats annual contracts were approved unanimously. Next, communications and
marketing director Tori Lawhorn presented the library's Banned Books Week campaign. We did kind of quotes
on banned books and intellectual freedom. We did the top 10 most challenged books and why.
kind of educate our audience on that. We also were able to reserve half of the glass case in City Hall
for September, which is something we haven't been able to do before. So that was another way to kind
of get our message out in the community.
We also always have a blog post that talks about statistics for book challenges and intellectual freedom,
especially throughout the country. ALA always releases those numbers right before National Library Week.
So we try to make sure that our posts and our content are always data-driven to inform our audiences
as well. And those always do really well. The MCPO Board of Trustees will meet again on March 25th.
the Richland Bean Blossom School Board met on February 17th. District Business Manager Paul Federle
gave an update on cash flows for 2026 through 2028, the timeline for the school's three-year financial
plan. He said 2026 numbers are already being made available. I encourage you to keep an eye on your
beginning balance in January and your ending balance in December. That's what this is all about.
knowing what's coming before it gets here, okay? So then because of that loss of revenue in 2026 and
knowing we need to have at some point a discussion about 2027 and 2028 because of what the legislature's
done to you. You've heard me say you're gonna lose 900,000 to a million dollars in your operations fund.
That's not chicken feet.
We're really gonna have to prepare for that two or three years down the road. Board member Brad Tucker
noted that the school is over budget by roughly $1 million in the next three years. Federally added
that the overage does not include consideration for additional costs, saying the town reorganization
could cost the school half of a million additional dollars. I was interested in what's happening here
with your city and the county.
and I saw that number. And so that's not in here, okay? So we're gonna, that's what we need to talk
about, stuff like that. So we're blessed to have a cash balance from some good, making good decisions,
but some things are being taken out of our hands now. Yes.
RBB Director of Budget and Finances, Debbie Tate, then updated the board on the status of two students
in private placements for special education. The two placements cost the school almost $1 million per
year. Board members asked how the school affords it. RBB Director of Special Education, Noah Dixon,
said that the state reimburses a large part of that cost. That's kind of the very nice thing with the
seek reimbursement that we get in the sense of if we
didn't have it, then we would be paying, I mean, without reimbursement, like for the JRC, $877,000.
But very thankfully, the state does give us that allowance to where
we're just paying a minimum and then the rest gets reimbursed. So. Dixon said that the students require
special placements because the school cannot provide them the help that they need. Board member Larry
DeMoss said special education reimbursements were discussed at the state house this week, but the chairman
of the education committee said there is nothing the state can do this session. On February 19th, the
Monroe County election board met to discuss the upcoming primary election and early voting.
The board is still deciding whether early voting will be 28 or 16 days before election day. Early voting
hours are also being determined. That if we're going to the 16 days, then the resources that we would
have spent between the 16 and 28, that we might be able to use those resources to add more polling locations.
for Election Day. But Election Day is a different situation than early voting. And in this county so
far, we've been about 50-50 for early voting versus Election Day. A lot of people cannot vote on Election
Day. They have to go to work. And they have to perhaps work 20, 30 miles away from where they vote.
So extending
Early voting hours would allow those people maybe a better time and shorten lines. And I don't think
we can make those decisions until we actually know when or how many days we're going to be voting. The
upcoming election will have more polling locations and will include new sites. Registered voters will
receive a postcard with election information in the coming weeks.
So a postcard will have to go out to every registered voter anyways before the election. We do that
after voter list maintenance to ensure that everybody is up to date and that they have correct information.
That would be a question for Clerk Brown I feel because I've not been here yet when we had to update
some of the locations.
The board then discussed potential problems with the updated voting locations and times. Jack Schmidt,
a proxy for board member Danny Shields, shared how voters can best help themselves. I think it's incumbent
upon us all to remember that voting is a privilege, and it's something that we should open ourselves
up to know where we need to go, when we need to go, and how we can vote. So the idea of having it
easy for everybody every single day. I think it's a bit extreme in my book. I think we just need to
self-gate. This is the time you can vote. Here are the days. You've got early voting on these days.
Different ways you can do it as well. You've got folks who will take you to the site. So again, let's
give people a chance to realize that they're responsible as well for this wonderful right we have. The
next Monroe County Election Board meeting will be on February 24th.
The Monroe County Redevelopment Commission met on February 18th. Highway Director Lisa Ridge introduced
bids on Curry Pike reconstruction. We also did some televising on some of the stormwater structures
underneath Curry Pike to get a feel of what we need as part of the bid and the reconstruction. We also
identified different sidewalk areas that need sidewalk replacement, curb and gutter.
fix this along that way this this first phase is basically Bloomington city limits which is around Beasley
Drive to the state limits or city limits around State Road 48 just is just south of State Road 48. Ridge
introduced the firms that placed bids on the construction project. We received five bids the sealed
bids were opened on February 5th at the County Commissioners meeting.
DC construction services was the low bid of $679,428.75. Our engineer estimate at the time was $609,993.75.
As you can see from the bid tabulation sheets, the highest bid went on up to $1.29 million.
The board wanted the bids to be approved so that they can be discussed at the Commissioner's meeting
next week. The motion passed by a vote of four to one.
The Richland Township and Town of Ellisville Reorganization Committee met on February 18th, where town
manager Mike Farmer talked about public outreach. He said the committee has yard signs for people and
businesses to put out and asked about funding for a billboard. Committee member William Ellis said the
billboard should be put up closer to the vote. I would hope that any organizations that donate to put
the billboard up
would do that closer to the vote. And I would suggest the digital one also by Kinzer 45, 46. Farmer
said he met with the Builders Association about the logistics of the reorganization process.
All the builders, obviously, are interested in what we're doing and what it might mean to them. The
other thing is, when I talk to the Builders Association, they're
They wondered if we would like to have a booth for free so we could provide information and answer questions.
Committee member Jerry Sanders said he could probably help with tabling. Mason Greenberg, a Realtor
of the Government Affairs Committee for the Indiana Upland Realtor Association, said the association
supports the reorganization. I came tonight to
see if there's any public opposition, any reason why we wouldn't want to support it, just making sure
we're having all perspectives in mind. So if there's anyone here with that perspective, I would welcome
hearing it, but I also just want to know that we're interested in being a vocal resource, a resource
in getting this out
And so understanding when and where we can, that's important for us. Ellis said he has heard public
opposition because there is not a finalized plan. He said the committee is working to address community
concerns as they arise. Committee member Andrew Henry then brought up subcommittees and reports. I really
like that idea because I want people to be able to see the unfiltered report
from the subcommittee. I also wanted to note there have been a bunch of updates to the website, which
is ellitsvillerichlandinfo.org. All the contact info for all the subcommittee volunteers is now listed
there. So if you want to contact any specific subcommittee volunteer on any one of the committees, all
their contact info is now there and you can ask them questions, give feedback, give suggestions while
they're still submitting and drafting their reports before they come to us for review.
So at the end of February, we get draft reports. We have a week to go back and forth with the subcommittees.
Then they submit final drafts in early March. And we have the rest of March for us to put together a
comprehensive proposal drawing on all those subcommittee reports.
The draft reports are due on February 27th and the finalized versions on March 4th. Henry said
the reorganization committee has until April 1st to use the reports to create a comprehensive proposal.
But I would really like the public to have access to all those subcommittee reports, unmodified, unredacted,
unsynthesized, so that anybody can look at them and see exactly what the subcommittee gave to us and
then compare that later with our proposal.
Ellis said the subcommittee members and the public should be involved in modifications to the reports.
He then made a motion to post final subcommittee draft reports before they are combined into a final
plan. The motion passed unanimously. During public comment, Ellisville resident Lisa McCarchuck asked
how the reorganization would affect taxes. She said to her understanding, there are twice as many voters
outside the city limits.
it's an easier sell to that majority to join Aletsville. It's not gonna impact their tax rate as much.
And so I think you know where I'm going with this. I would hope that as soon as possible, there would
be a clear communication to
all the residents of the affected area as to how this will affect their taxes. Ellis said that the tax
changes are still fluid and will depend on services outlined in the plan. Ellis said the website will
have all the information about the reorganization and people can contact him with questions. The Richland
Township and Town of Ellitsville Reorganization Committee will meet again on February 25th.
And that is all for Cats Week. Thank you for joining us. For Cats and WFHB, I'm Annalise Poorman.