Jasper Common Council meeting January 22, 2014

The Jasper Common Council met Wednesday night and held a public hearing on two properties.

The first was for the petition to vacate a portion of a public utility and drainage easement on part of lots 14 through 17 of Rolling Ridge Estates. The council passed ordinance.

The second was to provide the public an opportunity to express their views on the proposed federally funded Disaster Recovery 2 project to acquire and demolish properties in the flood plain between Main, Jackson, First and Second Streets – also known as Frogtown.

The remaining six property owners have appeared before the city in a meeting designed to gauge their interest in selling their properties. Their response has been positive, and Lisa Gehlhausen with Region 15 Planning said that a disaster recovery grant has been offered by the Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority to the city in the amount of $544,584.00 to assist with the purchase and demolition of the properties.

There are four residential homes and a business along with vacant lots located there.

The council passed a resolution that designates the land as “an area of need of redevelopment” so that work can move forward to obtain the properties.

-Utilities General Manager Bud Hauersperger delivered an update to the council on the Monday night Utility Service Board meeting, where both the board and the council passed the acceptance of settlement terms from Healthy Dubois County on the lawsuit against the City of Jasper on the Power Plant plans to convert to and burn a combination of Miscanthus Grass and Natural Gas as fuel sources to generate electricity.

During Hauersperger’s update, City Attorney Renee Kabrick announced that the settlement agreement was sent to Special Judge Sherry Gregg-Gilmore in Knox County for her approval. There is no word on when that final ruling will come from the judge.

-The council also passed a resolution to sell the property on the southeast corner of 15th and Newton Streets in Jasper. The lot is .08 acres in size and was identified in 2013 as one on a list of properties that the city intends to sell.

The city wants to dispose of the land since there is nothing that can be done with it from a civic standpoint, and the money gained from the sale would go towards replenishing the rainy day fund that was used in the purchase of the Country Club property.

-Dubois Strong Chairman Alan Johnson made a presentation to the council of the direction and priorities of the organization, now that he is the head of the economic development entity. (More on this in a future story).

-Finally, the council nominated and passed the name of Tom Schmidt as President Pro Tempore for 2014, the same position he held in 2013.