Kevin Berger – Page 26 – Easterday Construction Co., Inc.

Culver Town Council Work Session 8-8-23

August 14, 2023 by Kevin Berger

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.

Plan Commission
- The Building Commissioner was there and there was one Plan Commission (PC) member there, but not for that reason. While everything they discussed was salient, it was slightly off target without plan commission member’s input. They discussed redoing the Zoning Ordinance and things they thought should be fixed. It’s unfortunate they were doing this without the PC members, since the PC already has a list of things on their agenda to fix, mostly based on BZA input. Not bad on the TC’s part, but maybe redundant and in need of input from those dealing with it every month.
- Redoing the Zoning Ordinance is on the PC’s agenda, but as a general rule, that’s a step taken after a new Comprehensive Plan is adopted, so any recommendations can be incorporated. Not bad to get it started, but it probably should be slow-walked rather than having to do it twice.
- The Council was mainly talking about delegating redoing the Zoning Ordinance to the Building Commission and one of the Town’s Attorneys. I mean this with no disrespect to either of them, but I think if the Council is willing to put money towards this, which they would have to do with these individuals, they should consider hiring a consultant that can do this. The Attorney alluded to the amount of time required to research ordinances and tie things together. While I’m sure they would do a good job of this, someone or some firm that deals with these things daily would know those things without the research and with a higher level of efficiency.
- They did discuss prioritizing the current hot button issues, one of these being solar installations and battery installations. They set a goal to finish this well before their 2 year moratorium which is admirable. There are too many local people that have economic concerns tied to this to let it languish.
The Budget and particularly how it related to employee compensation
- While I know they listen to employees, I wonder if they are getting all the input they need here. They were concerned with the amount of overtime being spent and the need to “fix” that by adding staff where they could. There did not seem to be a lot of pushback on overtime from the employees. Are they sure that it is an issue with them or do they depend on it and look at it as a bonus?
- It wasn’t clear if they had run the numbers on the cost of new employees vs overtime. If the employees are willing and or looking for overtime, then the break even point needs to be analyzed. Overhead items such as insurance generally don’t go up with overtime, but would with new employees. Likewise, things like training, additional uniforms, additional equipment, etc. come with new employees, but not with overtime for existing employees. How does this shake out? It would be different for different departments.
Personnel
- There was discussion about salaries and what could be done other than monetary largess that could make the Town of Culver a better place to work. Various inexpensive, but meaningful suggestions were floated for consideration. In the end, they realize that they must be competitive with the surrounding communities. This has become a spiraling competition and will be hard to do.
- They discussed how to create more interaction between the board and employees. One of those suggestion was to go back to a liaison system where each council member would be responsible for a department. This was nixed because in the past this had created the perception of favoritism. Personally, I was glad to see that dropped since I feel like it undermines the authority of the Town Manager and their legitimate role between the Council and the employees. Particularly with a new Town Manager, that would create a difficult situation to reconcile. (I don’t know how they have the hierarchy set now, but when originally established, employees were to go through the Town Manager to the Council and the Council was to direct the Town Manager through the Council President creating a clear chain of command.)
Combined Fire & EMS
- A statement was thrown out that Culver is one of only five municipalities in northern Indiana that do not have combined Fire & EMS. Whether that is true or not, there are obvious value points in combined services, ranging from cross training, facility sharing and personnel availability.
- Personally, I think this makes a lot of sense, but I’ve been involved in these discussions twice in the past in regards to just a shared facility and the conversations have broken down. I don’t think this is a reason to drop the idea, but the challenge needs to be recognized.
- There was also discussion under this topic of forming a Fire Territory. I think they were wise in a decision to form a subcommittee to research this. Unfortunately, the subcommittee, at least initially, does not include representation from Fire and EMS. I think that would be important in order to achieve buy-in, plus it would add expertise from those in the field.
Comprehensive Plan
- There was discussion of the Comprehensive Plan and the current timeline. “We are farther along in the process than we were 6 months ago…” The Council remained mostly supportive, which seems appropriate since all of them have participated to at least some degree. I have some concern that this should have been addressed under the Plan Commission again, but regardless of that, it will come to the Council for final approval.
- There was discussion on extending the extraterritorial boundary (Two Mile Limit) to 2 miles. I was asked to speak on that and discussed the sewer issue and why I thought it was important to gain that control now. Granted, the town would not have to provide that additional sewer for free, but they need to get the extended boundary as part of the negotiation. (They have made this more difficult by implementing their solar moratorium. Property owners are generally already suspect of coming under Culver’s control with a perception of no representation. Mandates such is this one demonstrate potential issues that will make this difficult.)
- There was discussion on prioritizing the Comp Plan goals based on the public input meetings, i.e. the dots exercise. I thought this was good, but personally I liked what the Council did after the last Comp Plan, where they created an action plan based on those priorities. This led to some focus and was responsible for the Entry Level Housing Committee, pursuing and obtaining some grants, and finally, Culver’s successful Stellar journey.
Common Good
- Karen expressed the Council to come together for the Common Good. She expressed her concern that the Council had been fractured the past eight months and while they all had Culver’s best interest at heart, they had lost some of the spirit of working together that was achieved under Stellar.
- Karen expressed concern that if they remained fractured, the new Town Manager would struggle.

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.

Changing School Images

August 7, 2023 by Kevin Berger

I think I have written on this before (when the middle school gym was built), but my search capabilities weren’t sufficient to find the previous post. This is dating myself and includes some historic ramblings, so here we go…

I didn’t see any promotional material on the changes for the Culver Communit y School buildings this summer, so seeing the glass block come down and seeing it replaced with new black smoked glass was a bit of a surprise. I was also a bit amused by the progression.

Forgive me for doing this extemporaneously without doing the research, but it’s not something that I felt mattered beyond my memory.

Culver Elementary School Main Entrance in 1952.

The elementary school was built before air conditioning and was built with windows that opened across the bottom, about 4′ above the floor, and glass block above those windows reaching up 10′, letting in light for the high ceiling classrooms. Google failed me on finding good images of this, but I found the images to the right and below on the Maxinkuckee History Past Tracker page showing pictures of the school from the 1952 as the new elementary school addition was first opened.

The glass block isn’t very clear in this picture, but there was another interior picture on that page that showed the glass block a bit clearer. I’ve included that one to the left. I don’t have pictures from Easterday Construction’s history at the school, but I know we did the north addition and struggled to match the glass block, brick and windows, as the Architect wanted continuity.

The progression of the remodels has always amused me. The construction of the middle school gym was completed at the same time or just before the remodeling of the elementary school in the early 2000’s. Two different architecture firms were employed. It would appear they didn’t talk…

Culver Middle School Gym with glass block clerestory.

Knowing how Architects often think, I’ve always postulated the following: The middle school Architect knew that splitting the elementary school and middle school was a big change. (There was lots of controversy moving the middle school from being attached to the elementary school to attaching it to the high school.) He wanted to tie the new gym construction to the high school to which it was being attached. Similar brick and metal banding was used to accomplish this. But to ease the transition and keep continuity for the children moving from the elementary school building to the middle school building, the glass block “theme” was used, even though use of glass block was somewhat dated at the time. The gym include a glass block clerestory and some other glass block accents. Meanwhile, working within his own silo, the elementary school Architect wanted to update the building look and knowing that glass block is notoriously bad for insulation and weathertightness over time, replaced the block with colored metal panels! Hahahahaha! He also changed the entrance to create a simulated nautical theme (think masts).

New Main Entrance and colored window panels.

The remodel of the elementary school received a lot of hate. The new panels with the “rolling” accent lines deemed playful by the Architect were deemed gaudy by the community. (Picture to the left from the Culver Visitors Guide.) My Mother, Jackye Berger, was on the school board at the time and was somewhat incensed by the difference between what was approved and what was installed. The presentation to the school board was done using a full façade picture ( a long horizontally and short vertically picture of the entire east side of the building) with colored pencil (pastel) colors rather than the bright and shiny panels that were installed. The Architect later admitted that was intentional as they knew the bright panels wouldn’t get approved… As these things go, the Architect for the Culver Union Township Library addition then decided to carry the nautical theme and create a sail effect… which has since been removed/modified due to multiple issues…

Culver Community Middle School Gym during glass block replacement

So now we’re in a new era. The elementary school panels have been repainted in earth tones (very nice) and the glass block is going away at the middle school. Since I haven’t seen the plans, I don’t know if all of the glass block is going away, but it appears they are saving the vertical bands at the corners. Future generations will wonder why it’s there and a future school board will undoubtedly change that too.

RAGBRAI ’23

July 26, 2023 by Kevin Berger

My wife, Becky, is off on RAGBRAI this week. This is 50th year they’ve had the event and the 19th year Becky has done it. Only skipping 2020 when they only had a virtual ride (lame) because of the pandemic.

RAGBRAI stands for Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa. It was started by the Register newspaper in Des Moines and has grown to a huge event with international participation.

The year before she started riding RAGBRAI, Becky did the Heartland AIDSRide, which was a fundraiser. She got sponsors and then road from Minneapolis/St. Paul to Chicago across Wisconsin. That was the last year for that ride. It wasn’t raising enough money to make it worthwhile. She started looking for something similar and ended up settling on RAGBRAI. She’s gone every year they’ve had it since.

She drove to the east side of Iowa, to the ending town, last Friday and camped that night. She got up Saturday morning and got on a bus at 6:00am that took her to the starting town on the west side of Iowa. Sunday was the first day of the ride and this Saturday will be the last. There’s usually a big party the night of the last day, but Becky isn’t interested. She’ll get off the bike, load her stuff in her car, and head home… a 5-6 hour drive…

Yesterday was particular brutal for her, since it was the longest day of this year’s ride, at 86 miles, and the hottest so far, at 98 degrees. Some of you know that I’m also on Twitter, so I had to jump into this climate alarmist’s response thread with Becky’s “vacation”. If you can’t open the link, the original post said sitting outside in the shade when it is over 90 degrees is deadly. The first response was, “Arizonians say, ‘Hold my beer.’ ” My response to that is to the right.

She also sent me this picture, which I used to follow up the first one.

She does meet up with a lot of interesting characters! The event is known as the biggest party on two wheels, but the range of riders is huge. There is generally a beer garden set up in the first town each morning and for some, that sets the tone for the day. There are all ages and in some cases whole families. Some people ride a little and then take the SAG wagon. Some persevere (Like Becky) and ride the whole thing no matter how long it takes. (She’s gotten in close to dark a few times.) Then she’s talked about a few hard core bikers that get up in the morning, ride to the end town, back to the beginning town, and then back to the end town each day, riding each day’s route three times!

I am often asked why I don’t do this with her, and my two standard responses are either, “Because I’m not Crazy!” or “Pigs haven’t flown yet…”. While I could maybe, potentially, possibly, see myself getting into shape for the ride, I’ve never been a camper. After a day of that much exertion, I can’t imagine sleeping on the ground that night. Which is pretty much the standard option. On average, they expect around 30,000+ riders and since they try to stay off the main roads, that’s like 30,000 people descending on small towns like Plymouth for a night. Kind of like one night of the Blueberry Festival. Those towns mostly have to shut down, but on the bright side, all of the service groups get their fundraising covered for the year, by selling pies (RAGBRAI is known for pies) and having Church suppers with lasagna or chicken & noodles or some other high carb, easy to make in mass meal. Becky says sleeping on the ground is never a problem for her, because she’s tired enough to sleep anywhere. The biggest issue for her is setting up the tent at night when she’s tired, and breaking camp in the morning… when she’s still tired…

Four more days of this and she’ll head home. She’ll sleep most of Sunday and be up and off to work Monday morning, with a few sore muscles and some interesting tan lines.

If you’re interested in daily reports, I have an email chain I send out with pictures and updates. Just send me your address and I’ll add you there. Be sure to congratulate Becky if you see her. Or confirm that you agree she’s crazy! Ha!

10 Years

July 24, 2023July 24, 2023 by Kevin Berger

I’ve been thinking about a good friend, Mary Ellen Rudisel Jordan. Yesterday was her Birthday She would have been 72.

She died in a car crash 10 years ago. It doesn’t seem like it can be that long ago. She often comes to mind since I continue to work with the reincarnation of her firm, SRKM Architecture. The R remains as a tribute to Mary Ellen.

Mary Ellen was always my go-to when I needed a quick sketch or an elegant, but simple, solution to a minor design problem. We completed more than a few projects together, many of those for Richard Ford, another departed friend. Mary Ellen was returning from a meeting with Richard when she was struck by an oncoming car, in the wrong lane, on a blind hill, in a no passing zone. I can’t drive that section of road without thinking of her. Rest in Peace, Mary Ellen.

Culver Elementary School Parking Lot

July 5, 2023 by Kevin Berger

Best to start this out saying these are observations about which I’ve been too lazy to research. These are just what I’ve observed from my vantage point across the street.

Currently, Culver Community School Corporation is in the process of replacing paving at the elementary school and middle/high school. The paving is being ground off and (I assume) new asphalt will be installed. I understand that part of the paved area at the elementary school will be repurposed as playground with a new playground surface in lieu of asphalt.

When the elementary school lot was revised and repaved a couple of decades ago, it included landscape islands with small patches of grass and trees. To the school’s credit, they planted trees of significant size, but after the first year, care for these trees waned. Over the years, a few died and were left standing as skeletons. Eventually, these were cut down along with the remaining live trees, which frankly, were not doing well.

Former CES Island with curb cut flush and filled with gravel

The maintenance of the islands declined and eventually, a couple of years ago, the school cut the curbs flush with the pavement, stripped the topsoil and filled the area in with compacted limestone, effectively adding this area to the impervious surface and gaining a half dozen parking spaces.

This was sad as the islands effectively broke up the pavement and the trees would have eventually provided some respite from the hot black asphalt. It’s always interesting that during the hotter parts of the school year, some teachers will park on our side of Slate Street under the shade of our trees and walk a bit farther, rather than having their cars cooking on the CES parking lot.

The current project appears to be removing the islands completely. This shouldn’t be an impervious surface issue if the new playground area is a pervious surface. It is an aesthetic and functional issue. The islands broke up the expanse of asphalt. The trees looked nice and gave scale to the building. I realize that the islands hindered efficient snow removal, but it would have been nice to preserve them and to replace the trees. I’m sure the Tree Commission could have worked out something to include them in their planting plan.

I’m also curious what is to be done with the existing drywells. No inlet protection is being used, so they are becoming further clogged. I’m hopeful that remediation of these is part of the plan. To be effective, they need to be cleaned and I don’t believe they have been since installation.

This is an example of how my blog blathering helps me track time, since I was able to find where I had brought this up before, clear back in 2009! Ha! I recall watching the brick masons for the gym addition setting up their saw and cutting bricks directly over the drywell with no inlet protection whatsoever… Interestingly, the storm water project mentioned in the article in 2009 was completed, but it didn’t include any connections to the school’s system. Currently the drywells overflow, the parking lot fills and excess runs out the lot entrance and surface flows to the Lake Shore Drive storm water catch basins.