Jasper Chamber event: Officials give state of the city, county and school corporation

City, county and school officials took time out of their day on Thursday to give an update on the state of things.

In its second year, the Jasper Chamber’s “State of …” invites the mayor of Jasper, Superintendent of Greater Jasper Consolidated School Corporation, and the presidents of the county council and commissioners to give a short talk on the state of things in their respective areas of responsibility.

County Council President Greg Kendall led off the slate of speakers with a short talk that began with a what became a common theme of commendation for the response to the avian flu outbreak.

He explained the county was dealing with a budget deficit. “We have a $1.5 million shortfall in our funding from our property taxes,” Kendall said. “Over the last several years, the state has seen to it that certain taxes have been removed.”

Kendall reported that in response to the lost taxes, some counties in the state have increased their income taxes up to the maximum of 3 percent. He said the county was blessed to have the Economic Development Income Tax funds set back. “We may have to think outside the box and think what we will do if those funds are also depleted,” he said. “We may have to do something.”

He pointed out that the schools and cities will run into similar problems. “There will be some major decisions down the road,” Kendall said.

He pointed out that Councilman Jerry Hunefeld and he have a combined 72 years of experience in county government. He was briefly brought to tears as he spoke about Hunefeld’s service to the county.

He joked. As long as Hunefeld was on the council, Kendall explained that no one could call him the old man. Hunefeld has 40 years of experience as a county councilman and Kendall has 32 years.

Kendall also took a moment to give Hunefeld a gift before he took the podium to finish up the county council portion of the address.

Hunefeld spoke briefly about the tax issues the county is facing. He said that in the past the county has been criticized for the large savings account they funded through EDIT funds.

With a balance of over $11 million in the past, the county has been conservative with doling the funds out for projects outside of attempting to curtail property taxes and preserving roads. Last year, the council decided to loosen the lid on the EDIT funds but made a decision to not allow the money to go under $7 million.

Reasons given include being prepared for a major hit that would require those funds to remediate or to avoid expensive bonding for large projects like the Kentucky Street project in Holland and the Huntingburg Overpass. The Kentucky Street project is designed to keep heavy truck traffic off the town streets.

However, recently EDIT funds have been used to compensate for the county’s budget shortfall. “We committed to opportunities but on the other hand, we are now supporting our budget with these funds,” Hunefeld said.

“We are in the process to try to make the budget even leaner,” he added about how the council is attempting to preserve those funds for things other than operational expences.

He explained that although the county has money available, incidents like the bird flu support the local government holding money in reserve. “Imagine if we had a disaster that took out the bridges in the county,” he said. “Imagine what that would do. That is why we need to keep some in reserve.”

Commission president Larry Vollmer touched on the massive response to the avian flu. He explained that the organized response coordinated through the County’s Emergency Management Agency will be used as a case example of how to respond to the potentially economically crippling event in the future.

Commissioner Larry Vollmer gave a departmental rundown of the county touching on building improvements being completed at the health department and security center.

The commissioners are in charge of the roads of the county, and he explained in depth how many miles of roadway that includes. “We have 616 miles of roads in Dubois County,” he said. “380 miles of hot mix asphalt roadways, 142 miles of chip-and-seal roadways; 114 miles of gravel roads and 22 miles, yes, 22 miles of dirt roads. As you can tell, the county has a lot of roadway to take care of.”

He said the commissioners would like to see all the roads at least be chip-and-seal, but the money is just not available.

He proposed upgrading 400N from U.S. 231 to State Road 56 to accommodate truck traffic around the city rather than them having to navigate through 11 street lights.

He said he was excited to see the emergency communications upgrade get completed this year. “When any of us dial 911, we expect the pagers and radios to work to get the firefighters, law enforcement and ambulances to the scene as soon as possible,” he said. “This will do that.”

He then mentioned that after the meeting he was going to buy his wife her birthday present since her birthday was tomorrow. “And that’s no April Fools,” he said before closing.

Superintendent Dr. Tracy Lorey was next to give a rundown of the school corporation’s standings.

She explained although enrollment in kindergarten was down significantly for the 2016-17 school year, those numbers do fluctuate annually. For the 2012-13 school year, the school had about 3,274 students enrolled; 2013-14 had 3,234 enrolled; 2014-15 had 3,204 enrolled; this school year has 3,242 students.

She also spoke about the changing makeup of those students. “We have seen somewhat of a shift in the diversity of our students, which is fantastic. The world is a very diverse place,” Dr. Lorey said.

Across the district, the students body is about 83 percent white and 14 percent Hispanic, according to Lorey. However, Fifth and Tenth Street schools are about 25 percent Hispanic.

She said that about 33 percent of the corporation’s students are on free and reduced meals but again, when stepped down to only Fifth and Tenth Street schools, that number jumped to 48 percent to 50 percent of the student population being on free or reduced meals.

“Students who come from poverty also present some additional needs for support that create budgetary challenges for schools,” Dr. Lorey said. “I think sometimes people typically look at Jasper and they look at what they think is a lot of affluence in our community which is a very good strenth of ours. But we also have a lot of families that have a lot of needs and that translates into students that have a lot of needs as well.”

She reported that the attendance rate corporation-wide is 97 percent which is higher than the state’s average.

“We are also very proud of having a 98 percent graduation rate,” she said (see page 6 in the presentation).

In regards to the corporation’s budget, the general fund which covers the operation of the school including wages and benefits is $18,829,627. The general fund is impacted by the number of students enrolled in the corporation. Also, the school has about $6.7 million in debt service. (Page 9 of the presentation.)

She noted several achievements by the school corporation including having two four-star schools; Jasper High School and Ireland Elementary. Ireland is also a National Blue Ribbon School.

Her presentation is below.

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Mayor Terry Seitz spoke of the strengths and accomplishments of the city of the past year.

“I don’t say this with any ego; the way that Jasper goes is how the county goes,” he said. “The way Dubois County goes is how Southern Indiana goes. We really are at the point of turning all of our goodness into greatness. That has been my approach as mayor.”

With the route the city is taking, Seitz said the city is becoming more attractive to talent for local employer. “Essentially, we have to grow,” he said. “We don’t have enough people to meet the demand of the jobs and sooner or later those jobs will leave.”

With talent, Seitz sees entrepreneurship growing. “We may be able to free up some people and refreshen the entrepreneurial spirit that has taken Jasper and Dubois County so very far,” he said.

With the projects currently underway like The Parklands, the Downtown Improvement, Astra renovation and the potential cultural center involving the Jasper Public Library and Jasper Community Arts Commission, Seitz sees Jasper becoming a destination for the millions of people that visit attractions like Holiday World and French Lick.

He attributed the ability for these projects to be completed to the city’s strong economic core. “Our economic vitality has driven some civic investments we can make,” Seitz said. “Ultimately, these things all happen because of what is being invested by the private industry into our city.”

Seitz touched on the recent use of tax abatement and tax increment finance in the city to help existing businesses expand. “Ultimately, abatements and tax increment financing are based on new investments,” he said. “No new investments, no abatement. No new investments, no incremental increase in fully paid taxes.”

Seitz told the audience he hasn’t met a voter that is against new investments. “Without new investments, we die,” he said. “Tax abatements and contributions to TIF districts only occur on new investments. That is my approach as mayor and the approach of the City of Jasper.”

He then gave the following presentation to those attending highlighting the year’s achievements and explaining future moves coming to the city.

[gview file=”https://duboiscountyfreepress.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/State-of-the-City-2016_Jasper-IN1.pdf”%5D