Council approves withdrawal from Mid-States Corridor RDA

The Dubois County Council voted to approve an ordinance authorizing the county’s withdrawal from the Mid-States Corridor Regional Development Authority during its regular meeting on Monday.

The council passed Ordinance Number 2026-05 on its second reading, with Council President Michael Kluesner noting that the ordinance provides either a 12- or 18-month notice of withdrawal as required for members who have participated for eight years.

Councilwoman Deena Lewis cast the lone dissenting vote and used the meeting to address public criticism she received following her initial vote against the measure at the previous meeting.

“I received only one response asking me to vote with the rest of the council,” Lewis said, “All of the remaining responses from my District 1 constituents and the general public overwhelmingly supported my vote.”

Lewis shared several constituent comments supporting her position, including one that stated, “We’ve heard for years we will get a new highway. Don’t screw it up now. Build the darn road and let’s move on.”

Lewis also addressed what she described as personal attacks by Jason McCoy, the head of the Property Rights Alliance, through his dissemination of a 50-plus page document labeled “MSC Intelligence Dossier” to the council, media and State Legislators. McCoy was not in attendance at Monday’s meeting.

The dossier makes several allegations regarding individuals connected to the Mid-States Corridor, including connecting Lewis through her marriage to Terry Seitz and Seitz’s deceased wife, Ann, the first cousin of Gov. Mike Braun.

“Within that document’s fictional storyline, he maligned an innocent woman as a connection to me,” Lewis said. “He can say whatever he wants about me, because I am a public figure, but to resurrect a deceased woman, to make an arrogant point to me, is unconscionable.”

Lewis also criticized the two polls conducted by the opposition groups on the Mid-States Corridor project, calling them “push poll” rather than legitimate opinion surveys.

“A push poll is a type of survey that masquerades as research, but is designed to shape or steer respondents toward a specific viewpoint,” Lewis explained. “The Mid-States Corridor poll meets the criteria of a push poll.”

She also stated that the company, Public Policy Polling, was “a Democrat affiliated polling firm” and noted Brad Hochgesang, who worked with the polling firm on the poll, was also running on the Democratic ticket for District 48 in the Indiana Senate.

During public comment, Hochgesang pushed back firmly against accusations Lewis made regarding the polls. In response to the charge that it was a “push poll,” he defended the firm’s 25-year track record and argued that a reputable national polling company would not risk its reputation for a small Southern Indiana client for $8,000.

He noted that Lewis’s accusations, made under legislative privilege, could potentially expose her to legal risk if repeated outside the chamber. He also challenged her dismissal of the firm as Democrat-affiliated, arguing that polling accuracy — not political affiliation — determines whether firms get hired, and that the poll’s findings of majority opposition in six Republican-leaning counties actually cut against any claim of partisan bias.

Finally, he rejected the suggestion that he used the poll for political gain, saying he had no intention of running for office when the poll was conducted and that the responses from officials like Lewis motivated him to run.

As his time ran down, he also said it would have been easier to respond to these questions and accusations when he had been on the agenda to speak to the council about the corridor and the polling.

“I’ve stood in front of this podium multiple times. You didn’t ask me a single question on any of those occasions,” Hochgesang told Lewis. “Raising them now, when I was sitting back there, and I can’t respond unless I’m invited; that’s not accountability. That’s a speech delivered from a position where I can’t push back.”

Lewis also criticized Mark Nowotarski’s involvement in the anti-Mid-States Corridor groups’ efforts. In her statement, she connected Nowotarski’s involvement to the property he purchased along the corridor’s potential path, insinuating he knew beforehand that it could be affected. She stated that he met with city officials, who told him it had been part of the study area. She also condemned his connections to the statements and tactics being used by McCoy and Hochgesang.

Councilman Alex Hohl told Lewis that in his experience, Nowotarski has never brought up his personal property. “I think he looks holistically at how the county is going to be affected,” he said.

“I didn’t even know you had property that was going to be affected,” Councilman Doug Uebelhor said to Nowotarski, who was in the audience at the meeting.

During public comment, Nowotarski stated he was shocked by what Lewis had said about his character, given the cordial relationship they have had through their connection to various service groups. He said he felt she had been fed those lines to use in her statement.

He then moved to correct what he called a factual inaccuracy in Lewis’s statements, clarifying that he never met with city officials regarding his own property. He explained that he and his wife met with OFS CEO Hank Menke, a proponent of the Mid-States Corridor, prior to moving to the area to better understand how the project might affect the property they were purchasing for a retirement home. He told the council that during that meeting, Menke stated the property they were considering wouldn’t be impacted.

“Our five acres isn’t being taken,” he told the council. “We will be close. We will have the impact of the traffic, those types of things. But that’s not why I got involved with this. I got involved for all the people here that are affected.”

After the vote, Kluesner pointed out that the county will still be involved in the project. “I think as a county, whatever the INDOT does, we’re gonna have to listen to them and protect the county from whatever they want to do,” he said.

He reiterated that they had previously indicated the county would not contribute additional county funds to the highway project.

The Mid-States Corridor RDA has voted to extend its life an additional year, according to comments in the meeting. The council was unaware if there is an impact on their decision to withdraw.

In a phone call to the Dubois County Free Press, Mr. McCoy stated he was not the author of the “MSC Intelligence Dossier.”