- I pledge allegiance to the city and the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for
- which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Our heavenly
- Father, we come before you to see you in any manner. So let the full town serve, granted to you, with
- us throughout this reorganization process, and give us a mind and an understanding that we can do it
- like we see it have us do,
- We ask that you be with us tonight in the meeting, and we ask that you listen with all your heart. I
- say in Jesus' name, amen. Amen. Hey. Hello. Yes. Laura Hayden. Yes. So my good leader, Keith Michaels.
- Yes. Yes. They need to turn their mics up, and you all turn your mics up. Sober.
- All right, we're gonna skip counts expenditures. We're gonna have time to do those. We're gonna refer
- to old business, which is Ricky Plunkett. He is not here. And now we're gonna refer to the reorganization
- subcommittee, park subcommittee. Jim, Paul, you got something to sell us? Yeah, come up there if you
- would. We'll try to be formal tonight.
- My name is Jim Perry, and we don't have much to tell you but we are here to take notes Is there a portable
- microphone somewhere? Because this came up last time I can take that but we can take that back to the
- is that working I
- Good, thank you. Paula Anderson, Valerie Dewar, and I are sort of the three-person subcommittee. Okay.
- It's not like church. James Perry, Paula Anderson,
- Valerie Dewar and We're not sure whether we've not met Valerie face-to-face I Thought Valerie was a
- man, but I'm not sure Paula thinks it's a lady, okay I Center here in Ellisville, okay and William Ellis
- this added Valerie to the subcommittee after we had somebody leave us and
- who had originally been appointed. So we know virtually nothing about parks, cemeteries, and recreation,
- although I will say that my first job was for my uncle, who was the director of recreation at the City
- of Two Rivers, Wisconsin, town of 13,000 at the time. So I do know recreation, and I sort of know it
- firsthand, but that goes back 60 years.
- So what we need is we're interested in getting input from the parks board because I think I don't know
- why the subcommittee was created, but I assume that there's some correspondence between Structures and
- institutions of the town and Township and the subcommittees and I think there are seven subcommittees,
- and I don't know the list of all the sub Ivan sort of
- Memorize those but and I'm gone back to the notes of the reorganization committee, but we'd like your
- input And we're here to listen to you tonight to get input about What questions we should be answering
- in the report we have to? Finish by the end of February It's not it's not a long time, but it will you
- know but and to my knowledge there are no cemeteries in Alexville and
- that for which the town of Aliceville is responsible. But there are some parks, but we'll sort of, and
- we have the budgetary documents, I think, from the two entities, but is that an, is that the? That's
- an additional, yeah. Okay, good. I'll bring them out to you. Ronnie, take those out to Paul or Jim.
- So having said that, I'm prepared to sit down and sort of
- We're prepared to listen to whatever ideas you have that we should be working on What's one reason does
- that work for you? Yeah, that's one reason wanted Ricky here because he's kind of our sports whatever
- director We have a wellness coach from the Y
- our recreation director designate that's for your subcommittee Ricky's he's retired insurance agent
- yeah in the spring possibly up here I know he's trying to get that together that's really I think the
- only thing I
- And he's been, I mean, he does the five K's and. What's Ricky's full name? Plunkett? No, Puckett, P-U-C.
- Plunkett. Is it Plunkett? Yeah, sorry. Sorry. That's how many. Okay. P-L-U-N-K-E-T-T? Yeah. Okay. Yeah,
- that's it, yeah. I'll send you his contact information. So the Funfrolk, he was talking about doing
- it up here and having different like little kids games,
- It reminded me kind of how they used to do the fall festival when this highway wasn't like it is. Like
- the little ducks and, you know, a little ticketed games, kids get prizes, food trucks, et cetera,
- et cetera. I don't know when he was, like March or April. I think one of the ambiguities of
- these subcommittees is whether they have a role
- And I don't think our role should be specifying any budget or set of programs going forward.
- That's correct. I will add that one of your considerations is a budget consideration. The parks board
- is its own tax base. So what I was told about the parks trails. What does it mean to say that it's its
- own tax base? They get a portion of the tax
- You know, when you pay your taxes, a portion goes into the parks board, they do their own funding. It
- doesn't come from the general fund of the town. The parks board has its own tax compared to it being
- going out of the general fund.
- Basically, though, what you're saying is that that's an allocation of the property tax that goes directly
- to the parks board and is under the parks board jurisdiction for allocation. That's the way it exists
- now. Right. It'll continue to exist that way. So one of the things I was told about your... Why though,
- Denise? It's always going to have its own tax base. So one of the...
- That means we have funds to help with trails, build parks, all the park equipment over here and stuff
- like that to maintain. Is that by ordinance or what's the legal status? That is by ordinance. When the
- parks board was established, yes, in the state of Indiana, it has its own tax base. So this is state
- law then? Yes. And is this the $17,000 budget that was sent out to us last week?
- see on the line. More than that actually, but. I think that was 17,000 was the township was it. The
- last page is 25 or 26. I mean, so could you get us the could you get us the code? The legal code on
- the state law ordinance. I won't look up the state code. I don't have that kind of time.
- Because I mean, part of one of the issues for the reorganization committee is if they say, this is the
- structure for the township, this is the structure for the town, or we're merging, then this is all open
- to sort of recreation. So as I was starting to say, however, so what I was told one of your duties as
- the Parks, Trails, and Cemetery subcommittee is to look at a budget
- per se for the parks, because it will also include township, how much do you think will be required
- for the maintenance of the parks? And that includes snow plowing and grass mowing and any other item
- that may arise that needs maintenance. The only park that the township has is Campbell's Park, right?
- Campbell's Park's ours.
- Marcy Jane Lewis, and then they have Flatwoods. And then they have the baseball fields, too, right?
- And there's a park that starts with a D. Oh, Detmer, yeah. The baseball fields, though, as I understand
- it, are actually Richland Township? Yeah, Richland. Looking at Township, I mean, Flatwoods, Detmer,
- they're all controlled by the county parks and rec. Yes.
- I think, my personal opinion, if they're in Richardson Township, I wanna back, don't you? Yes, so when
- we met with the town's financial firm last week, so we thought Monroe County would still manage the
- parks, but they said no when we consolidate all becomes under the town. Yeah, okay. Mr. Perry, the IC
- code number
- the parks ordinance through the state is I see 36-10-3-3 36-10-3-3 What else we're thinking about Emily
- He does 5Ks in the fall normally. I think you said sometime after May, right? It's on the third weekend
- in September is a 5K that Ricky runs. It was the same time as the fall festival. Fall festival changed
- to the second weekend because of some issues. And Ricky told us that if he tried to change the date
- of the 5K, he would go clear down the bottom of the list as far as this
- group that he runs with, so we're in pretty good shape with him now as he left on the third weekend.
- Now let me ask a question. If we look at the town budget, is there a parks budget, a separate? I just
- said it to you. This is it? This is it, OK. That's the last three years. This year in 25 and 24.
- So in the 17,000 figure, which came from the township,
- that's a little more than that, yeah. Is there a way we can see what Monroe County Parks and Rec spends
- on Flatwoods on the Carson Trail that they cover and Denver? We should be able to get that because I
- think Serena, she's still on the Parks Board of Monroe County. So I think we'd be able to get that for
- you. If we can see that, then we can see the outlays that they already have for their maintenance
- and whatever else they need to do. I mean, Denver has the community gardens. I think they collect revenue
- possibly to rent those spots. I don't know. Can you state your name? Paul Anderson. I didn't want to
- let you know that I have asked Ricky to work in a 5k when we finish the trail that will also we're thinking
- maybe more of a spring to do that.
- Yeah. Great, yeah. To catch you up a little bit, do these tell them our problem with finishing the trail
- and the bathrooms? So we started, we got a next level trail grant and we were building our trail and
- then we had to take a detour. We thought Duke would work with us and then they wouldn't work with us.
- So we had to take a detour and because we varied from the plans, the DNR stopped us till we can
- submit updated plans for their approval. And then when it's approved, we'll finish our trail and bathrooms
- and the trailhead and everything. We've got about three quarters of a mile that goes into the woods
- down by the senior citizens that needs to be finished. Maybe it is a mile, I don't know. Well, there's
- also around DPW. Then we have some loops and stuff coming up. Just so you know, if you look to your
- left, you can see the DPW building back there. That's where we're meeting Thursday night at five o'clock.
- back there. It's going to the front right door. So. Awesome, Mr. Perry. For the Parks and Recreation
- Board, for the town code is 95-01. And that's the Department for Establishing a Parks Board for the
- town. Oh, if I can ask you.
- Question, how common are parks boards across Indiana? Very common. Just about every town and city has
- a parks board. And counties. And counties. Are there parallel entities in the township? There's no parks
- board for the township, no.
- That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it.
- That's it. That's it. That's it. That's it.
- And you could have a nine-hole course on concrete. And you can make up obstacles throughout the course
- that resonates and has some kind of appearance with Ellsville, like limestone. Make it where there's
- some limestone. We've got a really nice putters park here in town.
- and they do a great job. This is just something different and out there. Where would you look to put
- it? That's another thing, yeah. I have not really brought that up to the town manager or the board and
- stuff, but I don't know what's available up here, you know. I'd say the first one would be a temporary
- setup. Yeah. Yeah, this is how it went over.
- And we got a big field out here beyond the playground that we could probably use for that. But Ricky's
- got that in the back of his mind. He's thinking about that. We had an offer to do a discourse back in
- the woods that we got excited about. We decided we didn't want to do that. He said the discourse at
- the high school. How much it's used, I don't know.
- We're talking about a discourse. Yeah. We throw the disc, you know, throw it. You mentioned this miniature
- golf park. Why not try to sort of arrange for a private provider to do that? We can't. It's just in
- the thoughts right now. It's in the thought process. Yeah, all this is thought process.
- You know, we're kind of seeing what happens first. Yeah, all of us up here work. So it's just, it's
- kind of hard to get a lot of it going. I'm the one around town most of the time. So, but it's just something
- we'd like to do. And we think maybe with a new township, some money coming in from them, we'd have more
- money to invest in those type things. But I think we'd have to move out in the township a little bit
- too, wouldn't we? We couldn't just do everything over here.
- That's if and when this goes through. I mean, the township, as I understand it, is responsible
- for cemeteries, but only abandoned cemeteries. I come from a community where the cemeteries were run
- by the municipality. This over here, Denise, it's privately owned? Correct. OK. Which one? The Presbyterian.
- It's right across the street. There are several cemeteries in the town, but none are run or owned by
- the town. That's correct. There's one here. Or from the elementary schools. Where else? But they're
- not run by the town. Not run by the town. No. I think that's what you were asking. No. But if there
- were a merger or a consolidation of some sort, and I was shocked to know that abandoned cemeteries are
- the responsibility of townships. Yeah.
- And as I was telling Paul before that we started, that one of the first things I would do would be to
- approach the state legislature to say, no, we don't want responsibility for abandoned cemeteries. Take
- that off the ledger. But I think actually who starts a cemetery ought to be responsible for it in perpetuity
- somehow. But apparently there are cemeteries.
- including in this area that have been abandoned. I think the township has two that are responsible for
- it. I'm not sure. But that might be under state code. Yeah, but state code, just like Senate Bill 1,
- it can be changed. Yeah, that's correct. Right. Correct. Very, yeah. Probably ought to be changed. Did
- he say anything else you were thinking about, Forest Park? And again, I don't know if that's your goal is to,
- talk about. It's to be very broad and talk about a budget, what maintenance may be needed. Well clearly
- I think one thing we need to include in our report is if for instance if there are already parks that
- are part of the town or township that are sort of public responsibility that are sort of covered in
- the budgetary process in some way that we need to sort of speak to that
- But and then the other question is, well, maybe we ought to speak to the to the cemeteries that are
- not part of the budgetary process, but are the responsibility from the township and maybe suggest that.
- Well, I think taking over the. Flatwoods and Denver would be a big undertaking from April through October.
- Yeah, yeah, at least those are those are county parks. Those are county parks. Maybe a weekly morning at times.
- Flatwoods has, I mean, probably five to seven miles of trails that are mowed. Question, why would the
- town or a township or a merged entity want to take responsibility for the county parks? Since the county
- is responsible. It has to come with the new town organization. But if they're county parks, though,
- they're not town or township. They're in Richland Township.
- So it will come into the reorganization of the town. Even though they're county parks. And the question
- is why, or wouldn't the commissioners continue to be responsible for that? No, our financial firm, we
- had a meeting with them and they said if the parks in Richland Township, it'll come into the new
- town, reorganized town. But if they're county parks, though, these are not township parks? They're in
- the township, however. They're just run by Monroe County Parks and Rec. Monroe County Parks takes care
- of them? Yes. Okay. But that issue came up in another context, and that is the township is now patrolled by whom?
- public safety, I'm not in a position to. The county sheriff's department. Presumption was that the sheriff's
- office would maintain responsibility, the county sheriff's office would maintain responsibility for
- the township. Well, you're hearing things that I'm not quite aware of and I've been on every meeting
- I know of. That was something that was raised by the town council in the run up to the reorganization
- That was part of the, I think you were probably at that meeting, Jimmy. I know, I know we'll,
- my understanding is we'll be responsible. Scott Oldham was the one that raised the concern about that.
- Scott Oldham was responsible for policing Richland Township, but the Sheriff's Department has indicated
- they will help us do that until we get up, get our numbers up. We would probably find out a little bit
- more about that come Wednesday night.
- when that plan kind of gets feathered out there to people. That goes back to my question though about
- the parks. If the sheriff's department, the county sheriff's department is going to maintain responsibility.
- I didn't say that. I didn't say that. I didn't say that. They're going to help us cover Richland Township.
- So basically it'd be like mutual aid. Yeah. The Elto Police Department will take over.
- the Sheriff's Department will come in to assist and be the assisting agency. Let me ask this question
- then. If the current situation or current policing for the township is done by the Sheriff's Department,
- am I correct on that? No, you're not correct. They're not. Just like Ronnie said, it's my understanding
- anyway that if we take over the township. No, no, not if.
- the current situation. The current situation is the Sheriff's Department takes care of the township.
- Yes. And so what you're saying is that consolidation would impose some new responsibilities on taxpayers
- within those jurisdictions. For instance, Flatwoods Park. It's in the county now. If there was a type
- of an emergency there,
- more than likely an Ellisville officer would respond out there being closest to that area to provide
- what is called automatic aid into that area to see if they can stop the threat, start the search,
- or whatever. Am I correct, Jimmy? That's sort of the standing protocol between jurisdictions. Yeah,
- it's right now, yes. That's agreement.
- because the town goes right up to the Flatwoods border. So yes. So we can annex them right now. Has
- anyone had any conversations with the county about the status of park comedy parks in the township?
- We're not doing that. That's going to be another level to do that.
- I mean, I made a call to one of the county counselors just to have a conversation about what if or what
- this means. Because there, I mean, for instance, if all of a sudden you're saying the town of Ellitsville,
- which is now three and a half square miles, five square miles, takes over an area for which it's responsible
- 35 or 40 square miles. That's a significant change in fiscal obligations among other things. It's quite
- an undertaking, no doubt, quite an undertaking as you've been to most of the meetings. I'm not meeting
- out, I don't know how you're feeling. Okay, anything else?
- half hour already. We had a hard stop for six o'clock tonight, so that's okay. We got the council coming
- up. That's right. Let's move on to new business. I want Denise to explain the Heritage Center rental
- form approval. Denise? Sure. As you know, we got a ready grant to construct the town of Ellsville Heritage
- Center. It was quite the undertaking. We built it in
- footprint of the Stewart family barn that was there even put the bull back on the barn. And it's very,
- very, very nice building. So we could not include it with our normal shelter rentals. So what that put
- before you is the proposed Heritage Center rental agreement and the rules that
- We've had three meetings over and has been reviewed by our insurance carrier and town attorney. The
- only item that may change is town council wanted either deposit or certificate of liability insurance.
- It's since come up, if the building is damaged, the certificate of liability insurance represents a
- problem for us and that's collecting
- Our insurance person said that most likely they're gonna have a higher deductible to afford the policy.
- So it would be going after them for the money. Our dear insurance carrier could design, could deny the
- claim. So tonight at council town manager is going to ask council to remove the certificate of liability
- insurance.
- But before we open, I need your approval or comments and our changes and I can come back to your next
- meeting or approval based on either leaving it in because council may not wanna remove it or to remove
- the certificate of liability. We came up with an in town resident rate, non-resident and a $500 damage
- deposit that
- does get returned if there's. That's for either one. 500, 500 for either employee or non-employee. Right.
- Yeah. So anyway, the rules we came up with, the Heritage Center is gonna be open every day from nine
- to three and it's to be a gathering place so people can come in off the trail, take a break, we'll have
- coffee and water, restrooms available. We're probably gonna have art classes in there. I'm looking for a,
- grant to get some art teachers. And there's three meeting rooms, a lobby, an office, a kitchen, little
- galley kitchen, two restrooms. And so we want the public to use it during the day has like a set of
- gathering place or I came to our attention that groups such as Boy Scouts and other organizations didn't have
- place to meet so that was another reason we built it or maybe a group wants to come down and have coffee.
- And so we're hoping it'll be used and then from 4 p.m. of an evening and all weekend, you can rent it
- for events. And so let me know if you have any questions. So tell me what number the insurance thing
- is in here. The insurance is on the part, the application.
- physically sitting in that building, because if it's just open, people are, I know that a lot of people
- in the town are not wild, but just having an open building is. So we do have a security system and we
- do have cameras. And so, but yes, somebody will be there. We talked, there may be times where we may
- have to put up, be back in half hour, 15 minutes.
- but there is an office there so people can go there and work. I wanna move the planning department down
- there, but they won't let me. So it's just really, really a nice building, and I hope when it opens,
- you all stop by and take a look at it. So Mike's gonna recommend that this insurance thing be taken
- out? Yes. Okay. But town council established it, so.
- they may wanna keep it. I would ask for a motion to approve the heritage trail rental agreement with
- the understanding that the insurance liability clause may be taken out. Is that okay? I'll make a motion.
- Thank you. Is there a second? I do have one more question. I know there's only four parking spots. Is
- there potential to expand parking? Because if I were renting that for a birthday party, there's gonna
- be more than four cars.
- So the closest parking, we had more parking, but part of the drive into it was in the floodway, the
- building's not. So that shortened the number of parking we could have. But I think we have six and two
- or three ADA spots. And then you can certainly park, have somebody drop you off and they can park.
- up at the Campbell's Park shelter parking lot or across the road at the old street department. Which
- is going away, I guess, pretty quick. And they haven't filed a demo for demolition permit yet. Okay.
- It is going away. At some point. That's what we're hearing, yes. You know that building floods, so.
- Oh yeah. Okay, so I got a motion by
- and then I got a second by Emily. Jimmy Durnall. Yes. Laura Hale. Yes. Katie Michael. Yes. Ron Van Dievener.
- Yes. And Emily Kelly. Yes. And that was for approval of the town of Illtel Heritage Center rental agreement
- with the idea that maybe this certificate of liability of insurance will be taken out.
- Okay. Thank you. And then the rules you saw attached that they also will be required to sign will be
- displayed. We'll frame those at the Heritage Center as well. And you will see some public announcement
- about its opening soon. Thank you. I'd like to revert back to accounts payable. I just found that Serena
- did give me accounts payable. So
- There's not much difference. There was last time. If you'll take a quick look at them, we'll get those
- approved. Except counts payable. Okay. Jimmy journal. Yes. Laura hell. Yes. Katie Michaels. Yes.
- Ron Van Deever, yes. And Emily Kelly. Yes. Kind of on back on real quick on old business on the trails,
- I saw the signs are going up and they look nice and stuff. Are they gonna possibly look at putting them
- both directions? Yes. Okay. There'll be one at each end.
- I'm at the mile marker signs at locations. Right now, it's just on one side of the post. And if you're
- walking that way, you see it. But if you're walking from a different direction and you need to see it
- quickly, you can't. Right. So that's where Fire Department, how they did their longitude, latitude,
- and the mile marker. It's going from west to east, and the mileage starts after, carries on from the
- Carson Farm Greenway.
- So when the trail is finished, we will go west to east and do it backwards, yes. Okay, thank you. Yeah.
- Really, it's really nice. Is there anything else? I wanna thank Mr. Perry and Paul, oh yes, go ahead.
- Paul, I had tickets for cert to whatever it is at the auditorium
- canceled last week, so it was moved to tonight, so she has to be there by 7. But one thing we wanted
- to promote tonight was that we are meeting on Thursday night, the next two Thursday nights, the 5th
- and the 12th. The 5th will be in the DPW building. The 5th in the DPW building. And the 12th will be
- here. And the one on the 12th will be here. And we are interested in public comment.
- And it'd be great, for instance, if we had somebody from the township who could attend or would be there
- for public comment. And I don't know how to get the word out other than to be here now and say, we'd
- like public comment for the subcommittee. We can ask tomorrow night or Wednesday night when we're here
- to. And maybe somebody can, during the town council meeting tonight, mention it.
- if something comes up on the reorganization. But we set those two meetings, and we thought, well, this
- is an opportunity to get public input, additional public input in addition to meeting due here. Have
- those meetings been advertised? Subcommittee meetings, like we're having on the 5th and 12th. It's up
- to the subcommittees to do that. Some of them don't want public meetings yet. Some of them do.
- Like, I think public safety's going to have one. You can promote ours, said Denise, if you want to.
- We schedule a public meeting, but we don't have a way to sort of make the announcement. So planning
- and zoning hasn't wanted a public. They just met last week for their first time. And they just discussed
- a lot of things about the re-org.
- It's up to the subcommittees if they want to have public or not. OK. All right. Anything else? Ronnie?
- So you know, I make a motion to adjourn. Miss Laura? No. Kelly? Katie? Oh, come on, Katie. You got something
- to say? I don't. It's been moved and seconded for adjournment. Ronnie? Jimmy Durham? Yes. Laura Hill?
- Yes. Katie Michaels? Yes. Myself, Ron Van Deemder, and Henley Kills.
- Who seconded that? Anybody? Second. All right. Thank you. I like my hammer.