This month marks 40 years since Easterday Construction Co., Inc. (ECC) joined Associated Builders and Contractors (ABC). I’ve written about this before, and our continuation with ABC has been for the same reasons. In recent years, our chapter, ABC of Indiana, has become ABC of Indiana/Kentucky. Despite some continuing concerns, this has mostly been a good combination.
Our main reason for continuing with ABC is the the voice it has in the Statehouse. That’s not to say we don’t take advantage of other membership options. We currently have an employee in their NLRB approved Carpentry Apprenticeship program and we yearly document our safety through their STEP program. We have also participated in their Excellence in Construction program, winning awards for our work on the Charlie Creek Inn, Dr. James Ford Historic Home and the St. Mary of the Lake renovation. We have a representative on the Chapter Board.
While ECC hold memberships with several Chambers of Commerce, NFIB and other groups, ABC is the only business group that caters specifically to the Merit Shop construction industry. We’re proud to be ABC members and support their work while they support our work.
New public art has appeared at the corner of Lake Shore Drive and Ohio Street in the form of a painted fire hydrant. It appeared without any fanfare that I saw, so I’m guessing this wasn’t an approved installation! Ha! While I am not a big fan of the other Dalmatians in Town, this one makes me smile every time I drive by it.
I’m sure there are those out there that consider this defacing public property. That’s probably part of the reason that this was done with no fanfare. I had a former client that was known for saying, “It’s quicker and easier to ask for forgiveness than to ask for permission.”
Back in the day, my mother, Jackye Berger, was part of the Maxinkuckee Jr. Women’s Club (sic?) and as a bicentennial project, they painted many of the fire hydrants in Culver Red, White, and Blue with some of the more artistic members creating versions of Uncle Sam and Founding Fathers. I couldn’t find any original pictures from Culver’s past, but I found the FL version to the right, which is a pretty good representation. Obviously this was part of some national movement. Too bad it lost steam. It resulted in a lot of fire hydrants taking on patrons. Some were kept up for years, but I only know of one that still has the patriotic colors. With the exception of a few red & white ones downtown, the only one I know if that’s still Red, White and Blue is on the Millers Merry Manor property fronting on S.R. 10. (See below)
The Culver Crossroads Committee has an Arts Committee. They are promoting art installations and things such as the various murals going up around Culver. I wonder if this kind of blast from the past could be taken under their purview as public art…
If you know of more decorated hydrants, share them in the comments!
A notice of a Culver Town Council Work Session came out Friday, August 4th, with the agenda listed as, “The Culver Town Council will meet to discuss goals and expectations.”
Since I have been serving on the Steering Committee for the new Culver Comprehensive Plan, I thought this would be of interest and expected there to be a full house. Because of the early time, I tried to listen in on Teams and attempt a bit of multi-tasking. Unfortunately, Teams failed again, with the sound going out about 10 minutes in. I was the only one online and after Karen (Clerk Treasurer) jumped through hoops to try and get it working for me for about 10 minutes, I told her I would just come down to the Town Hall.
I was a little surprised and disappointed when I got there that I ended up being the only one in the audience that wasn’t an elected official or an employee. Later on Karen said she had organized this as somewhat of a bonding meeting for the Council and the new Town Manager, so that made me feel a bit better about the low turnout. That doesn’t really excuse the public (and the candidates for these offices) for not getting involve. It was also an important meeting that received no press coverage…
There were several topics discussed, so I’ll hit the high points and my thoughts on them.
All in all this was a good meeting. I would have liked to have seen more participation, but I’m sure it was helpful to the new Town Manager and I’m hopeful that it was a move in the right direction for meeting Karen’s goal of reminding them of their common cause of making Culver better.
I have a good friend who is a Librarian. She shared this with me. I have a sister-in-law that is a Library Director. We have done work many libraries throughout this area where the Librarian or Library Director are friends from our past work together. This is an important issue for Libraries and you should consider contacting your legislator about it.
The flier above gives information for legislators in Pulaski County. Since most of my lurkers are from Marshall County, our State Senators are:
Ryan Mishler if you’re a resident of District 9 in NE Marshall County
200 W. Washington St.
Indianapolis, IN 46204
Phone: 800-382-9467
or 317-232-9400
Email: Senator.Mishler@iga.in.gov
Mike Bohacek if you’re a resident of District 8 for the remainder of Marshall County
200 W. Washington St.
Indianapolis, IN 46204
Phone: 800-382-9467
or 317-232-9400
Email: Senator.Bohacek@iga.in.gov
And our State Representatives are:
Jack Jordan if you’re a resident of District 17, which covers the majority of Marshall Count
200 W. Washington St.
Indianapolis, IN 46204
Phone: 800-382-9841 or 317-232-9651
Email: H17@iga.in.gov
Jake Teshka if you’re a resident of District 7, which covers a small part of Marshall County west of LaPaz
200 W. Washington St.
Indianapolis, IN 46204
Phone: 800-382-9841 or 317-232-9981
Email: H7@iga.in.gov
Scale
October 4, 2023
Kevin Berger
Commentary, Culver, Politics, READI
Community, Culver, government, Planning, The Dunes
It seems that The Dunes is not just the talk of Culver, but that has bled over into other areas of Marshall County. It came up in side conversations at the last One Marshall County meeting, which was interesting. Local Architect, Brent Martin, made the comment, “300 doors? That’s a small community.” That made me think. Most of the conversations in Culver revolve around that number being more than 25% of the current population of Culver. So Culver grows by about 20% with this addition. That number is 17% of the population of Argos. That number is 61% of the population of LaPaz. That number is less than 3% the population of Plymouth. It’s probably at least 6 times the population of Burr Oak! And yes, all these numbers assume that there is no more than one soul behind each of those 300 doors; an unlikely prospect.
But this is an unusual conversation. I don’t recall that kind of percentage being discussed when other developments have been planned. It’s more usual for there to be a discussion about jobs created, kids in school, etc. Few communities in our area would consider adding population a negative. I know the fact that The Paddocks and Sand Hill Farm Apartments was adding residents was never discussed as a percentage, though using the same fuzzy math, they added 6% to Culver’s population.
I’ve heard from multiple people how much this will change Culver. Many of these are people that moved here and undoubtedly created some change in the fabric of the town as well. When I look at the pie chart I included here, 20% doesn’t seem that large to me. Though most of us know the 80-20 rule, I doubt that this 20% will be that cohesive and organized.
But this is also why I’ve advocated for some additional urban planning input on this. I think the Town has done a reasonable good job in hiring appropriate legal representation. They have hired appropriate financial representation. Why not hire a consultant that will look at the land-use/infrastructure/social-fabric parts of this addition to the town? It would seem to be money well spent considering the amount of angst it is causing with current residents. It will never and has never been easy. Back in the dark ages when I was on the Culver Chamber of Commerce board, Eric Freeman, then Chamber President, and I joked that the unofficial motto for Culver was, “Change is bad, even if it’s Change for the Better.” That’s one thing that hasn’t changed…
4 comments