Tag:Volunteering
Taking One Thing Off the Plate…
In 2017, when I was serving on the Culver Stellar Committee, I volunteered to set up a Twitter, now X, account to promote Culver and the Stellar activities. Through that, I connected to Madison, Indiana, our sister Stellar Award winner, and many of the State agencies with which we were working. It was something I thought was important at the time, and I was happy to help promote Culver. Since that time, I have put up posts with pictures and reports about Town meetings, sent out promotional things and reposted many of the event announcements that appeared on Town, Gown and Lake. Most of what I see says that marketing should be multifaceted and you should meet your audience where they are. I assume some of them are on X. It wasn’t too onerous, but did take time converting PDFs to JPGs and editing things to the 140 character format. I included some humor here and there, but avoided anything I thought would be controversial.
Apparently I was wrong… Last week the Town said they had received complaints about it being too political. I’m not sure if that’s just because of the Elon controversy and the fact that it is X or if there was something else. (Maybe someone was upset about me reposting Notre Dame Women’s Basketball posts?) They couldn’t tell me what the issue was as this was decided without looking at the site, so it will remain one of life’s mysteries. I have at time posted or reposted things from elected officials, but never from candidates. In any case, I was asked to take the references to the Town off the feed or shut it down. 1) I was doing this as an promotion for the Town and if they don’t want that, I just won’t do it. (Thus this post’s title.) and 2) It’s not worth my time to figure out either of those things, so I made one last post and I’m letting it sit idle.
I’m choosing, mostly, to take this as a time saver for me. I do think it was a positive for Culver or I wouldn’t have continued it. Out of curiosity, I went back and looked and the site had 327 followers, including: News/Talk 95.3 MNC, Michiana Life, Pulaski County Community Foundation, Startup South Bend, INDOT Northwest, The Ron Rubin School for the Entrepreneur, Marshall County LLN, Swan Lake Resort, Anita Goodan (reporter), Purdue Center for Regional Development, Leadership Marshall County, Madison Main Street Program, Argos Hardware, Visit Marshall County, Marshall County Blueberry Festival, Summer Horan ABC57, The Pilot News, The Lakes Magazine, Patronicity, Indiana Philanthropy Alliance, Indiana Bond Bank, Jeff Rea (South Bend Chamber, South Bend Tribune, Economic Outlook), Indiana Office of Community and Rural Affairs (OCRA), South Bend Elkhart Regional Partnership, US Fish and Wildlife, Hoosier State Chronicles, Suzanne Crouch (former Lt. Gov.), Launch Indy, Max 98.3, Visit Indiana, Marian University, Inside INdiana Business, Indiana Economic Development Corp. (IEDC), AIM, Marshall County EDC and that’s every entity and none of the people. Many of those sites are from outside Culver, so they were seeing Lions Club Pancake Breakfasts, Lakefest calendars, and other events they might not have otherwise seen. Honestly, I don’t know if those are all still active sites, but they were at one time when they chose to connect to Culver. And maybe having that many followers is the problem, since I’ve been so political and controversial! Ha!
Most people don’t know that I was behind the @CulverISstellar site and I mostly took pains to keep it that way. I was doing this as something to give back to the Town. I feel it was an asset to the Town or I wouldn’t have been doing it. As is typical with social media these days, apparently someone couldn’t just scroll on. If there had been a negative comment with someone questioning a post, I would have just taken it down. I hope it was not just at Town control issue, because that would be even more sad. I made 6,547 posts over the last 8 years. With X, it’s hard to tell who is looking unless you’re controversial. I wasn’t.
In any case, this is another end of an era for me. Such is life.
Leroy Bean
Easterday Construction lost another long time employee last week. Leroy Bean worked for Easterday Construction Company for over 43 years, His funeral was last Friday and not only featured an ECC hat hanging by the casket, but his time with Easterdays was mentioned throughout the ceremony.
Leroy’s family has had an outsized connection to Easterday Construction with not only Leroy’s long legacy, but both of his grandsons, at least four of his nephews and one great nephew working for us at one time or another. Nephew Bob continues with us and has been here with a tenure rivaling Leroy’s. He also has a similar career path, moving from truck driver and laborer, to skilled trades to job superintendent today. Listening to the impact Easterday Construction had on Leroy and his immediate family was humbling. ECC has always been a family business and that extends to employees and their families as well.
Leroy had an outside impact on ECC and the Culver Community. Active in several local organizations while working for ECC, he continued that through his retirement. (See the adjacent obituary.) It’s obvious that not only will he be missed by his family, but also by the ECC family and the Culver community too.
We used to do a newsletter called the Easterday Parade. in volume 1, No. 6, October 1990, there was an employee profile on Leroy. Here’s the text of that profile:
Leroy William Bean has been an employee of Easterday Construction Company since 10/01/62. Nearly 20 years ago, Leroy was hired by Russell L. Easterday as a truck drive, to work and make deliveries out of the shop. He held this position working under Cubby Bair for approximately 3 years, until the office began receiving too many complaints about Leroy from the job sites. Apparently, Leroy was such a hard worker, that the superintendents wanted to keep him on site.
Leroy went from truck driver to laborer to labor foreman under Denny LaRue to Job Superintendent. The first major project placed under his control was the Saemann Building downtown in Warsaw. This was the renovation of an old building under the Historic Preservation laws in 1982 and 1984.
While on the jobs, Leroy was shortened to Roy, which is how many of us still know him. Avon Murray, an electrician that worked for ECC in the past, did this bit of editing for him. Apparently, Avon thought Leroy was too long to remember.
Leroy was born in the Chicago area on May 7th, 1941 and grew up around Culver. Margaret, Leroy’s wife was from Winamac. They were married on July 22nd, 1961. They have lived in their current residence, in the town of Culver, for the past 22 years. They have spent loads of time and energy remodeling and recently won a civic award from the Culver beautification committee. This effort is still continuing, with Leroy spending much of this summer remodeling their kitchen with new cabinets made by “Uncle Bud” Cripe.
Leroy and Margaret have two daughters, Kim and Cheryl, both in their late twenties. They have three grandchildren, Kim’s 8-year-old son, Roy Lee, Cheryl’s 6-year-old son, Mogan and 4-year-old daughter, Amy.
End of an Era
With the retirement of Marshall County Commissioner, Kevin Overmyer, 2024 is the end of an era. Kevin, like is father, Glenn, served multiple terms as Marshall County Commissioner. In total, Marshall County went 46 out of the last 52 years with an Overmyer at the helm. I know there has been some ugliness over the last couple of years, but the positive impact of Kevin and his family has had on the county is undeniable.
A few years ago, a friend decided to run against Kevin. I was asked to support him in his bid to replace Kevin. My friend told me he thought Kevin’s time was up and that he could do a better job. I had to explain to him that, 1) He might be able to do as good a job… eventually…, but 2) As long as Kevin was willing to serve, his knowledge and connections were invaluable. This was a difficult position for me to take as I generally agree with the idea of term limits, the transfer of power, and the value of new blood. The problem is as long as that’s not a universal concept, the value of connections to politician at the State level are undeniable for a small rural county like ours. His respect in the larger State arena was shown when he was elected President of the Indiana Association of County Commissioners (IACC) Northwest District.
The above was demonstrated to me during my time serving on the board of MCEDC. A new project in Bourbon drew attention and support from the State. State officials attended the meeting and speeches were made. As was generally the case, Kevin was not one who wanted the spotlight, but it was turned on him by the State officials in their speeches and in the casual conversation at the reception that followed. Stories were told of Kevin’s trips to Indianapolis for meetings as well as kitchen table meetings with these officials in Kevin’s home. Kevin understood the power of these connections and that power was subtly demonstrated that day.
Kevin also understood the value of keeping Marshall County on the map. He made a false start at an economic development entity several years before MCEDC came to be. It failed due to some of the petty bickering that often occurs between municipalities, i.e. what I have referred to in the past as the lasting legacy of old basketball rivalries. Rather than dropping the initiative, he let the idea cool and simmer. Then, learning from his mistakes in the first attempt, he resurrected it in a new form, addressing the stumbling blocks of the previous attempt. This is what became MCEDC (Marshall County Economic Development Corporation), without which our county wouldn’t have made strides to create shell buildings that brought in new businesses, wouldn’t have created the partnership that brought Regional Cities dollars to Marshall County and kept us in that partnership, participating in READI and READI 2.0. When I was Chairman of MCEDC, I recognized the struggle with the municipal rivalries and with Kevin’s (and Roger Umbaugh‘s) help MCEDC created what became the quarterly County Development for the Future meetings. Those meeting broke down barriers, which helped Culver achieve Stellar Community status. That lead to Kevin co-chairing Marshall County’s Stellar aspirations and eventually achieving Stellar Region status.
Kevin also understood the need to work together and move things forward. Bureaucracies are born to grow and create barriers. Even at the County level, this is the case. Kevin had a keen eye for when the red tape was necessary and when it was just an impediment. He was someone you could call to make the right connections, make determinations between what was just policy and what was law, and help make things happen. He was adept at doing this, not only with those under his direct jurisdiction, but down stream in municipalities and upstream at the State. Kevin had a keen nose for BS and who was trying to do the right thing and who was trying to just skirt the rules.
I understand Kevin’s desire to retire and leave the stress behind. He has served Marshall County well, though that isn’t always recognized and no one is perfect. All and all, I feel he’s left a positive legacy. Which is the best any politician can do.
So, I want to end this wishing Jesse Bohannon the best and with the hope that he also can create a positive legacy in his time in office serving as commissioner. It won’t be easy and some of the rancor from the campaign will make this less than a smooth transition. As with my friend I mentioned earlier, I know those relationships can built again, but there is no shortcut for the time that requires. Kevin had a bit of a shortcut through his family name and Glenn’s years of service. Jesse will need to build that all on his own. Good luck Jesse! I hope people remember your time in office fondly 20 years from now too!
MCCF ’24 – End of Year Donations
Easterday Construction has always supported Marshall County Community Foundation (MCCF). This year there’s a way to increase the impact of your donation either through existing funds or starting one of your own. Consider MCCF in your end of year charitable giving.
Disappointing…
February 10, 2025
Kevin Berger
Commentary, Culver
Community, Comprehensive Plan, Culver, government, Plan Commission, Volunteering
The February meeting of the Culver Plan Commission has been cancelled because “there are no agenda items”… This is a missed opportunity to tackle the myriad of suggestions from the the new (last year) Comprehensive Plan.
For Example, this would have been a great opportunity to invite Donny Ritsema from MACOG to come speak about areas of the new Comprehensive Plan that fall under the plan commission’s purview. Donny lead MACOG’s group (along with Olivia Nix) that helped coordinate the comp plan steering committee, helped organize much of the public input and produced the final plan. I’m sure he could have helped define a plan of attack and weeded through what needed addressed by the Plan Commission on their own and for some things, in concert with the Town Council or other Town entities.
I would suggest that the Comprehensive Plan should be a standing agenda item for the Plan Commission as a reminder that there are things to address. When there is a pressing agenda that takes a lot of time, then it would get passed over, but when there is a short agenda or like this month, nothing coming before them from outside, then it could be picked up and moved forward. Incremental advances are better than nothing. As always, I respect that the Plan Commission members are volunteers and appreciate the time they put in. It’s often a thankless job. The comp plan items should be easy items to move forward though. Those items have already gone through community review, plan commission review and town council adoption. Now we just need to implement them.
For some of my previous thoughts on this, see my Implementing Culver’s Comprehensive Plan post.
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