Power expected back for many Monroe County electric utility customers by midnight Thursday

Around 2 p.m. on Wednesday, the traffic signals at the intersection of 1st and Walnut Streets were without power (June 26, 2024).
A downed tree on the Rail Trail, south of Country Club Drive (June 26, 2024).
Two workers in the streets division of Bloomington’s public works department restore a one-way sign at the intersection of 6th and Walnut streets (June 26, 2024).
Monroe County commissioners postponed their meeting from Wednesday to Friday at 10 a.m. (June 26, 2024).

By mid-afternoon on Wednesday, the Duke Energy outage map showed an estimated time for restoration of power for many areas of Monroe County by Thursday at midnight (June 27 at 11:59 p.m.)

In a 4:30 p.m. email message, Duke Energy notified media that most, not all, Monroe County customers would have their power restored by Thursday at midnight. Many customers could have their power restored sooner than that, according to the message.

Only customers who can safety receive power can have their power restored, according to Duke’s message, so if the meter box has been pulled away from a house, that would preclude power restoration.

Duke’s efforts to restore power come after a fierce storm blew threw the area on Tuesday around 4 p.m. knocking out power to around 45,000 electrical utility customers. By 3 p.m. on Wednesday, Duke Energy’s outage map showed closer to 36,000 customers in the Monroe County area who were still without power. Continue reading “Power expected back for many Monroe County electric utility customers by midnight Thursday” →

Big thunderstorm slams into Monroe County, knocks out power to 45K electric utility customers

Duke outage map as of 5:06 p.m. on June 25, 2024.
The view of Bloomington’s city hall around 4 p.m. onJune 25, 2024
View of Janko’s Little Zagreb awning just after the storm blew through on June 25, 2024.
A little leaf linden street tree fell on a car parked on 6th Street between Morton Street and College Avenue on June 25, 2024.
American linden tree split off and blocked two lanes of traffic on Colleage Avenue across from the Monroe County courthouse on June 25, 2024.

Around 4 p.m. on Tuesday, a thunderstorm packing winds that were reported to the National Weather Service as gusting up to 78 mph smacked into Monroe County from the west.

The storm left at least 45,000 electric utilities customers without power, once the nearly 2,000 South Central Indiana REMC  ratepayers were added to the 43,000 Duke Energy customers who were disconnected.

As of 8:20 p.m. The B Square was not able to find any areas on Duke Energy’s outage map that showed estimates for the time when power would be restored. [Updated: As of 10:30 a.m. on June 26, 2024 the word from Duke Energy is that they are still assessing damage and should have more information later in the day.]

The two-block stretch between Bloomington’s city hall and the Monroe County courthouse in downtown Bloomington showed clear evidence of the storm’s impact. Continue reading “Big thunderstorm slams into Monroe County, knocks out power to 45K electric utility customers” →

Randy Cassady to run for District 2 Monroe County commissioner as Republican

Randy Cassady gives remarks at the Monroe County courthouse (June 25, 2024).
Randy Cassady files his paperwork to be a Republican Party candidate for District 2 Monroe County commissioner. Deputy clerk Larime Wilson is checking his submission (June 25, 2024).

Randy Cassady announced on Tuesday that he will appear on the Nov. 5 general election ballot as a Republican candidate for District 2 Monroe County commissioner.

Cassady, owner of the local electrical company that bears his family’s name, will be competing for the seat with incumbent Democrat Julie Thomas, who is seeking her fourth term as a county commissioner.

Cassady currently serves as a member of Bloomington’s redevelopment commission as well as Monroe County’s redevelopment commission.

Thomas won her party’s primary by a three-point margin over Peter Iversen, who currently serves on the 7-member county council.

Even though the three county commissioner seats are numbered based on a geographic area of the county, all registered voters countywide can cast a ballot for all three county commissioner seats.

Reached by The B Square, Thomas texted: “We will see him on the campaign trail!” Continue reading “Randy Cassady to run for District 2 Monroe County commissioner as Republican” →

Public bus notebook: Ridership plateau, Cassady gets charging work, Bloomington westside service mulled

Last Tuesday’s monthly meeting of Bloomington Transit’s board included the first post-pandemic report that has not shown significant ridership growth in the most recent month’s year-over-year numbers.

In May 2024, BT gave 103,263 fixed-route rides, compared to 103,216 rides in May 2023. That’s still a smidgen more. But it’s nothing like the double digit percentage year-over-year increases in the first three months of 2024 and for all of 2023.

Through the first five months of the year, fixed route ridership for BT is still up by 14 percent over 2023. From January through May in 2023, BT gave 995,896 rides, compared to 1,140,666 rides in the first five months of 2024.

The one action item on the board’s Tuesday agenda was approval of a $743,000 contract with Cassady Electric, for the installation of charging equipment for some new electric buses that are supposed to be delivered starting in the fall of this year.

Also getting some discussion at last Tuesday’s board meeting was the expansion of service past the western boundary of Bloomington, to serve Cook Medical, Simtra BioPharma (Baxter), and Ivy Tech Community College, among other employment centers. BT general manager John Connell said his goal is to have some level of service out to that area by the start of the fall semester.

Continue reading “Public bus notebook: Ridership plateau, Cassady gets charging work, Bloomington westside service mulled” →

Packed house as residents voice opposition to proposed Duke Energy rate increase

State senator Shelli Yoder. (June 20, 2024)
Monroe County councilor Cheryl Munson. (June 20, 2024)
State representative Matt Pierce. (June 20, 2024)
Administrative law judge Greg Loyd, who presided over the Jan. 20, 2024 hearing in Bloomington.

Close to 170 people packed into the Olcott Young Room of the Monroe Convention Center in downtown Bloomington on Thursday night, for a field hearing on Duke Energy’s case to increase electricity rates.

That’s a big number, because it’s the maximum occupancy for the room under the fire code.

The rate increase is also a big number. By the utility’s own reckoning, Duke’s proposal would increase a typical customer’s bill by at least $330 a year.  The Citizens Action Coalition puts that number at over $500 a year.

Duke Energy cites a need for additional revenue in order to make the electric grid stronger and more resilient, and a need to make its operations friendlier to the environment. Duke has issued a statement describing some recent projects in Monroe County that will improve the resilience of the grid.

In connection with the proposed rate increase, Duke also cites its energy assistance tools, designed to help consumers manage their bills.

Based on the 300-day timeline for utilities rate cases,  and the April 4, 2024 filing by Duke, a final order on Duke’s request can be expected around the end of January 2025. The rate case can be tracked on the IURC’s docket. Continue reading “Packed house as residents voice opposition to proposed Duke Energy rate increase” →

New jail notebook: 0.2% tax advised by Monroe County consultant would generate $8.5M a year

June 21, 2024 meeting of the Monroe County council’s long-term financial planning committee. From the left corner of the table next to the empty chair, going clockwise: councilors Cheryl Munson, Marty Hawk, Trent Deckard, Geoff McKim, and Peter Iversen; Mike Guerrettaz, and Greg Guerrettaz, with Financial Services Group.

This year, Monroe County should enact a corrections local income tax (LIT) at the full 0.2 percent rate that’s allowed by state law, according to Greg Guerrettaz with Financial Services Group (FSG).

Guerrettaz was speaking at a Friday morning meeting of the Monroe County council’s long-term finance planning committee. FSG is the county’s financial planning consultant.

The additional jail income tax would have an impact on all residents of the county. A household with a taxable income of $60,000 would pay $120 a year due to the jail tax. [Listen to this report] Continue reading “New jail notebook: 0.2% tax advised by Monroe County consultant would generate $8.5M a year” →

May 2024 food inspection reports for Monroe County released by health department

Caption: The image links to a dynamic map. (The color coding scheme goes like this: Green=Zero violations; Yellow=At least 1 non-critical violation but no critical violations; Red=At least 1 critical violation.)

Monroe County’s health department has released the reports for inspections of food service operations that were conducted in May 2024.

Of the 115 places that were inspected in May, 48 (42 percent) had no violations.

Recording at least one critical violation were another 49 establishments.

Recording at least one non-critical violation, but no critical violations were 18 places.

Summaries of the inspections completed in March are now available on a list which is published on the county health department’s website.

Continue reading “May 2024 food inspection reports for Monroe County released by health department” →

Bloomington council imposes time limits on final speeches, leaves question time unaltered for now

Created with DALL·E 3. Prompt: “A photo with foreground of an hourglass sand timer, that has run out, using bokeh technique. The background is a city councilmember giving a speech in city council chambers.”

After reducing public commentary time from five minutes to three minutes per speaker two weeks ago, Bloomington’s city council has now imposed for the first time a limit on how long councilmembers can talk on a given topic.

Each of a councilmember’s two chances to speak comes with a time limit—5 minutes for the first chance and 2 minutes for the second chance.

Under the old rule, there was no explicit limit on the number of times that a councilmember could talk. There was just a prohibition against someone talking twice before everyone had a chance to talk at least once.

Under the new rule adopted by the city council on Wednesday night, there’s a limit of twice.

The vote on the ordinance, which was put forward by council president Isabel Piedmont-Smith, was 5–4. Voting for it were: Piedmont-Smith, Matt Flaherty, Kate Rosenbarger, Hopi Stosberg, and Isak Asare. Opposing it were: Dave Rollo, Andy Ruff, Sydney Zulich, and Courtney Daily.

The vote was taken after 1 hour and 40 minutes of deliberations on the topic.

The ordinance passed by the council does not affect the time that councilmembers use to ask questions and get answers from the presenter of the ordinance, which is most often a city staff member, not a council colleague as it was on Wednesday. Piedmont-Smith presented the ordinance, as its sponsor. [Listen to this report.]

Continue reading “Bloomington council imposes time limits on final speeches, leaves question time unaltered for now” →

New pay grades for Bloomington non-union workers OK’d by city council, could have $10M impact

Bloomington’s city council on June 18, 2024. Participating on Zoom were Kate Rosenbarger and Courtney Daily.
Bloomington’s director of human resources Sharr Pechac (June 18, 2024)

At its Tuesday meeting, Bloomington’s city council unanimously approved a new salary grade system for the city’s roughly 430 non-union employees, which would eventually mean pay increases requiring around $10 million dollars of investment.

The old non-union salary system had 12 grades, each with a range of compensation. Each job title is assigned a grade. The compensation for the person with the job title falls somewhere in the range.

The approved new system has 14 grades. The grades at top of the new scale have significantly higher salary ranges than the top of the scale in the old system. The grades at the bottom of the new scale have lower salary ranges than the bottom of the scale in the old system.

The $10-million per year figure came from Bloomington’s director of human resources Sharr Pechac as a ballpark estimate of the eventual impact of re-grading all of the city’s non-union positions that are listed in the 2024 salary ordinance.

As a part of the same ordinance as the one that approved the new salary grades, the council added a new deputy clerk position.

The new deputy clerk position is for communication and outreach, in connection with supporting city boards and commissions.

Continue reading “New pay grades for Bloomington non-union workers OK’d by city council, could have $10M impact” →

Annexation lawsuit: Judge rules against Bloomington on constitutional claim, but it’s not over

On Tuesday, judge Nathan Nikirk issued a ruling that denies the city of Bloomington’s constitutional challenge to a 2019 state law, which causes annexation waivers to expire after 15 years.

Nikirk’s ruling, on five consolidated lawsuits, affects Bloomington’s annexation in five different areas. There’s one lawsuit for each territory.

The areas rendered in black, Area 1A and Area 1B, had their lawsuits with constitutional claims dismissed by the city. The remaining five five areas, shown in different colors are subject of the consolidated lawsuits with a constitutional claim.

Even if the city of Bloomington does not appeal the ruling, that does not mean that the question of annexation in the affected five areas is settled.

There’s more to the five consolidated lawsuits than the constitutional claim.

Nikirk’s Tuesday ruling has no effect on the separate litigation for two other areas (Area 1A and Area 1B) about which a bench trial was held in early May.

A ruling on the merits of annexation in those areas could be expected towards August. Continue reading “Annexation lawsuit: Judge rules against Bloomington on constitutional claim, but it’s not over” →