Letter: Stay informed about Mid-States Corridor meetings

Did you know there have been two meetings in the past two weeks regarding the Mid-States Corridor? Neither did I. It makes one wonder why these meetings were not made public.

The first meeting was about two weeks ago at the Loogootee City Hall with Mike Braun’s spokesperson Ms. Jan Hicks. She was in town for a Community Outreach and Q & A session, with the Mid-States Corridor a main topic. Guess what? No one from the community attended. It wasn’t because no one was interested, it was because there was no public notification.

This begs the question, did the press know? Did the Mayor know? Did the City and County Councils know? Did the Martin County Alliance know? If any of these entities knew of the meeting why didn’t they share the information with the public? If none of them knew, then why did Jan Hicks show up? Have our elected officials and stakeholders become indifferent to the Mid-States Corridor, or are they too busy to do their jobs?

The second meeting was this past Friday. It was the Lochmueller Group/Mid-States Corridor RDA Board meeting. Mark Schroeder and Ken Mulzer, Jr. chaired this meeting. At the start of the meeting Mr. Schroeder stated they would have no discussion nor take any questions, as this was “just a financial meeting”. There were no other attendees except for a small number online. With the recent announcement that funding has been secured to start the Tier 2 studies, a “financial meeting” is the correct forum to ask questions and discuss the Mid-States Corridor’s future and the project in general. Again, the issue here is who is planning these meetings and why are they being done so in secret? Shouldn’t there be complete transparency?

Both of these meetings were opportunities lost by the tax-paying public to query our elected and appointed leaders on issues that affect our communities. Are our elected leaders so aloof that they see no need for the public’s input? It’s been apparent since the beginning of the Mid-States Corridor Project that Hank Menke, Mike Braun, Shane Lindauer and the rest of the DuBois/Spencer County cabal feel this way. They have repeatedly, and publicly, shown this to be the case. But our own local city and county officials? I can’t bring myself to accept they are cut from the same cloth. Maybe I’ve been wrong.

As residents and interested members of our communities we must hold all of our elected officials to account. We must demand they be open, above board, honest and devoted to the public’s interests at all times. We need them to be informed and to inform the public and the press. Without this mutual trust and respect we cannot make the improvements to our communities, to restore our communities to their former economic well-being. We, and our leaders, need to have vision, fore-sight and above all else information. With these we can have healthy debates and foster greater progress for our future. 

It’s us, our local leaders and the press who will stop the Mid-States Corridor. We must all stand together and keep saying “No” to the Corridor.

Jim Arvin
Rutherford Township
Martin County