Oct. 1, 2026: Possible cuts to 2027 Bloomington budget, new money for parks capital planning

Weather Talk

Based on the National Weather Service forecast in text and charts here’s some advice.

Thursday: You won’t need rain gear through the day, but this is the final day of dry weather for a bit. The partly sunny skies will push the high temperature to 88F°.

Friday: Take an umbrella or a rain jacket. Especially before noon, there’s at least an 80% chance of rain. The high will hit just 67F°.

Sign up for weather alerts: Monroe County emergency alert system

Recent articles

• Council’s proposed Bloomington budget cuts add to millions, but savings are much smaller.  Bloomington councilmembers will review millions of dollars in proposed 2027 budget cuts Wednesday, but many would trim placeholders or align appropriations with expected spending rather than produce new savings. Policy-driven proposed reductions total about $452,000.
• New grant opportunity with $10M in play could reshape Bloomington parks capital plan.  Bloomington parks is reworking its capital plan after a Lilly-backed grant created the possibility of up to $10 million more for projects. Priorities include pools, ice, pickleball, baseball, trails and a possible sale of the department’s South Walnut Street property.

Other notes

Patience required for Monroe County government website. Here’s the word from IT at the county (emphasis added in bold):

We are writing to inform you of an upcoming data migration that will have an impact on the County website. Our website host, the State of Indiana, has partnered with a new content management company. This requires that all data on our site be migrated from the previous company to the new partner. The migration is planned to begin on September 30th and run through October 15th. During this time, our site may experience issues to include but not limited to temporary outages, broken links, or missing data. Please note that our website address and navigation of the site will remain the same as it is currently. The Technical Services Department is working closely with the State and their partners to limit disruption to services. We apologize in advance for any inconvenience.

On the calendar

County roadwork. On the 10 a.m. Thursday (Oct. 1) meeting agenda for the Monroe County commissioners are a few items involving county roads. One is the award of a paving contract for parts of Liberty Hollow Road, Bowman Road, and Brown Road. Another is a contract for construction inspection services for the high friction surface treatment at four locations on Fairfax Road. A third road-related item is a contract to engineer and develop a scope for the necessary repairs on Russell Road.

Election board. A regular meeting of Monroe County’s election board is set for Thursday (Oct. 1) at 1:30 p.m. The board will likely get a briefing on preparations for the start of early voting, which is next Tuesday, Oct. 6 at Election Central in Showers North on Morton Street.

Pizza Trail: Oct. 1–31. October is pizza month. And in Bloomington this is commemorated with a Pizza Trail that Visit Bloomington is promoting. The idea is you sign up for a mobile pass, which sounds like a kind of digital punchcard. Every time you check in with one of 20 different local pizza joints, you get a credit. And at the end you can redeem the points for gift cards to ... pizza joints. There

Bloomington Paint Out: Oct. 3. The fifth annual Bloomington Paint Out takes place rain or shine on Saturday, Oct. 3, at Bryan Park, with artist check-in from 9:30 a.m. to noon at the Woodlawn Pavilion. Artists of all ages and skill levels can paint anywhere in Bloomington, with finished work due by 3:15 p.m. for judging in several age and experience categories. Free classes, supplies and artist demonstrations will be offered at the pavilion from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. There is no registration fee or advance registration.

Book crawl Oct. 23–24. You probably know what a bar crawl is. It’s that, but with bookstores. From the organizers:

As we continue to sell tickets, we wanted to let you know along with the keynote speakers on Oct. 25, Wright Thompson and Michael Koryta, we are also launching our first Bloomington Book Festival Book Crawl. It will be happening Oct. 23–24.

Here is what the book crawl will look like: 9 participating bookstores — Book Corner, Caveat Emptor, Knitting Romance, MCPL Friends of the Library, Morgenstern Books, Naughty Dog Books, Redbud Books, Steve’s Book-O-Rama, and Vintage Phoenix.

• Begin at any of the above participating bookstores to pick up your passport.
• A single purchase (ANY purchase, no minimums) from EACH store gets you a stamp in your passport. (A purchase is necessary to receive a stamp.)
• Each stamp is an entry into a raffle to receive 2 free tickets to The Bloomington Book Festival on Oct. 25, 2026.
• Each fully completed passport is an entry into a raffle for the grand prize: over $500 in gift cards, autographed copies of Wright Thompson’s “The Barn” and Michael Koryta’s new release “Die Famous,” and 2 free tickets to this year’s Bloomington Book Festival.
• Once your passport is completed or you are finished with the book crawl, leave your passport with the last bookstore you visited.
• The drawing for the prizes will take place the morning of Oct. 25.
• The winners will be contacted that morning via email and text and announced on our social media!

Meet: Redford

This very, very, good boy is a Staffordshire bull terrier. Here’s what his previous owner has written about Redford.

Redford is a velcro dog. He loves chewing on sticks and will thrive in a fenced in backyard. He can be a bit particular with other dogs but has lived in a home with another dog and cat. He'll do best with older kids. Redford is currently roommates with a cat and dog. He needs to be supervised when interacting with the cat, he wants to play but is strong and clumsy. He will thrive in a home with a backyard and older kids. We do a lot of walks and he loves to play catch. Red is a stick connoisseur and loves to break them down! He may be allergic to peanut butter. As long as you let him out regularly he is housetrained; however, he hasn't figured out how to let you know he needs to go. Red is a fun dog and loves to cuddle but unfortunately we are allergic to him. He's about 65lbs but has short stubby legs. He kind of looks like Scrappy Doo!

Photo Finish: Kirkwood Avenue & Washington Street

The Photo Finish items are drawn from the B There section of the B Square website.

Here’s some news about B There. It was conceived as a way for Bloomington residents to document the new and interesting things they encounter in this town, as they go about their ordinary business. Each item is just a photo with a caption and a headline that just gives the closest street intersection.

Participation has been very light so far. But here’s an uppercase thank you to those of you who have submitted items! THANK YOU! It’s still me who files the vast majority of items, and I live downtown. That means readers might wonder: Does anything in Bloomington happen outside of downtown? Anyhow, I’m currently testing out an app to make taking and submitting a B There photo simpler. Look, I have installed the test app on my own phone! Hope to roll it out sometime soon. If you would like to help test it out, send me a note.

Thanks for reading. I hope you have a great weekend!

Dave Askins
734-645-2633
dave@bsquarebulletin.com

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