140-acre rezone in southwest part of town OK’d by Bloomington city council on 7–2 vote

Close up proximity map of Summit District PUD.

Overview map of Summit District PUD.

A rezone request for about 140 acres in the southwest part of Bloomington has been approved on a 7–2 vote of the city council.

Dissenting on the vote were Dave Rollo and Andy Ruff.

The vote came at around quarter to midnight on Wednesday, after deliberations that started around 9 p.m. Rollo wound up being denied a chance to give final comment, when his colleagues voted to end the discussion before he had a turn.

It was the third meeting for the council’s consideration of the Summit District planned unit development (PUD), which could allow construction of an estimated 4,250 units of housing in five new neighborhoods, to be built over the course of the next 10 years.

A PUD zoning district is a kind of customized zoning that uses an existing zoning district as a baseline, but diverges from it, in order to deal with challenges that are unique to the district.

The council had previously discussed Summit District two weeks ago, on May 1 and two weeks before that, on April 17. Continue reading “140-acre rezone in southwest part of town OK’d by Bloomington city council on 7–2 vote” →

Discontinued: NHanced Semiconductors planned expansion on Bloomington’s west side

Bob Patti, president NHanced Semiconductors (May 14, 2024)

Monroe County councilors from left: Marty Hawk, Cheryl Munson, Trent Deckard, Jennifer Crossley, and Peter Iversen. Attending on a remote video conferencing platform was Geoff McKim. Kate Wiltz did not attend. (May 14, 2024)

Tax abatement gets final OK from Monroe County, could mean NHanced production of chips by fall 2024

https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1MPwXPeN28DzOspwyZ6qBPWWBbs5nzKU&usp=sharing

The planned expansion by NHanced Semiconductors just west of Bloomington’s city limits, has been discontinued.

The expansion could have meant 250 new jobs, many of which would have paid around $100,000 a year.

The public announcement from the semiconductor firm came at the Monroe County council’s regular Tuesday meeting, from NHanced president Bob Patti.

In December last year, the county council unanimously granted a significant tax abatement for the NHanced expansion.

As reasons for the decision to end the company’s effort to expand on Bloomington’s outskirts, Patti cited some federal funding that did not pan out, as well as decreased prospects for private investment.

Patti said, “We are disappointed that we were not able to get CHIPS funding and there were some other avenues that were open to us that did not pan out.” Continue reading “Discontinued: NHanced Semiconductors planned expansion on Bloomington’s west side” →

Primary Election Day: Polls are open until 6 p.m. on Tuesday, May 7 in Monroe County

Election Central processing of early in-person and mailed-in absentee ballots. (May 7, 2024)

Monroe County election board from left: Monroe County clerk Nicole Browne; Judith Benckart; and John Fernandez. (May 7, 2024)

Election operations building at 3rd and Walnut streets. (May 7, 2024)

The polls at Monroe County’s election operations building at 3rd and Walnut streets opened Tuesday morning, when election site inspector Maqubè Reese gave the official announcement: “The polls are open!”

Audio: “The polls are open!”

The announcement is not just for fun. It’s a requirement of state election law, which says the announcement about the start of voting must be made “in a loud tone of voice” to “the people outside the polls.”

A technical glitch prevented opening of the polls at 6 a.m. sharp. The code that was supposed to open the scanner for processing ballots did not work, and it took several minutes for that issue to get sorted out.

Even though the announcement from Reese came at 6:15 a.m., there were no voters queued up waiting—the first voter did not arrive until a few minutes after Reese gave the announcement.

The only “people outside the polls” when Reese gave the official opening announcement were The B Square and Monroe County Democratic Party chair David Henry, who is running for one of the three at-large county council seats. He’s competing with Matt Caldie, Trent Deckard, and Cheryl Munson for one of the three nominations from the Democratic Party.

The B Square will try to provide some updates through rest of the day. Continue reading “Primary Election Day: Polls are open until 6 p.m. on Tuesday, May 7 in Monroe County” →

Final 2 days of early in-person voting in Monroe County: Saturday, Monday

Early in-peson voting counts for Monroe County through May 3, 2024.

Whiteboard at Monroe County Election Central at Madison and 7th Streets. (May 3, 2024)

With two days of in-person early voting left, around 3,800 Monroe County residents have cast an in-person ballot in the May 7 primary election.

That’s based on the day-by-day tallies of voter numbers posted on the wall of the election operations building (aka the old NAPA Auto Parts Store) at 3rd and Walnut streets and a partial total through the day on Friday (May 3).

The election operations buiding is the one designated location for all in-person voting in Monroe County.

Two days are left on the early-voting calendar: Saturday (May 4) from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Monday (May 6) from 8 a.m. to noon. Continue reading “Final 2 days of early in-person voting in Monroe County: Saturday, Monday” →

Report: Monroe County should build new jail with 450-500 beds, not renovate current one

Monroe County sheriff Ruben Marté. (April 30, 2024)

From left: Lee Jones, Julie Thomas, Penny Githens. (April 29, 2024)

Monroe County should build a new jail with 450 to 500 beds, according to a report prepared by RQAW Corporation, out of Fishers, Indiana.

The report recommends against renovating the existing facility at 7th Street and College Avenue, which has a total of 287 beds.

The estimated hard cost of a new facility, according to RQAW, is around $76 million, with additional costs like design and construction contingencies, and fixtures and furnishings, bringing the total cost to around $99 million. That’s not an estimate for a “co-located” justice center that would include space for all the courts, prosecutor, public defender, probation, and other support services.

The hard construction cost of a fully co-located new facility is pegged at around $142-152 million by DLZ, which is the county’s consultant for master planning and designing a new jail facility. That’s based on $70-75 million for a justice center and $72-77 million for the jail and sheriff’s office. Continue reading “Report: Monroe County should build new jail with 450-500 beds, not renovate current one” →

GOP candidates for Monroe County commissioner field questions on economic development

From left: Kristen Weida, Joe Van Deventer, and Paul White, Sr.

At a Wednesday afternoon forum hosted by the Bloomington Economic Development Corporation at the Monroe Convention center, three rounds of county commissioner candidates from both major parties fielded questions from a moderator and the audience.

That included the two Republican candidates for the party’s District 3 county commissioner nomination.

Competing for the GOP nomination for the District 3 county commissioner seat are Joe Van Deventer and Paul White, Sr.

All registered voters in the county can cast a ballot in a District 3 race. The geographic districts for county commissioners are used only to define the area of the county where candidates have to live.

Primary Election Day is May 7, but in-person early voting has been underway for a couple of weeks, at the Monroe County election operations center at 3rd and Walnut streets.
Continue reading “GOP candidates for Monroe County commissioner field questions on economic development” →

2024 Election notebook: Dems raise $82K in races for county councilor, commissioner

Based on required pre-primary filings by Democrats in Monroe County races, about $82,000 has been raised by nine candidates for county commissioner or county councilor in the May 7 primary.

The pre-primary reporting period ended April 12. The required CFA-4 documents were due by noon on Friday.

The four Democrats running for the three at-large county councilor nominations raised a total of $15,940.54. Leading the way was incumbent Cheryl Munson, who raised $5,024.60. She was followed by challengers David Henry and Matt Caldie, who raised $4,289.94 and $3,800.00 respectively. Incumbent Trent Deckard raised $2,826.00.

The two Democrats running for the District 2 county commissioner nomination raised $24,184.45, with challenger Peter Iversen collecting more than twice as much as incumbent Julie Thomas. Iverson raised $17,024.42 compared to $7,160.03 for Thomas.

The three Democrats running for the District 3 county commissioner nomination raised a combined $42,521.21. Incumbent Penny Githens raised $20,523.85 compared to $17,593.00 by challenger Jody Madeira. Challenger Steve Volan raised $4,404.36.

The raw totals don’t give a complete picture. Continue reading “2024 Election notebook: Dems raise $82K in races for county councilor, commissioner” →

First week of in-person early voting in Monroe County closes out with about 100 voters per day

The first four days of early in-person voting are in the books for Monroe County.

Primary Election Day is May 7. But voters can cast a ballot early in person for the next three weeks.

As of around 4 p.m. on Friday, since the start of in-person early voting on Tuesday, 392 people had cast a ballot in Monroe County, according to election division staff.

Monroe County’s early in-person location is the election operations center, located at 3rd and Walnut streets.

Another 143 absentee ballots have been returned so far, out of the 818 that were mailed out.

There are more than 91,000 registered voters in Monroe County. Continue reading “First week of in-person early voting in Monroe County closes out with about 100 voters per day” →

In-person early voting starts in Monroe County for May 7 primary elections

Campaign signs on College Avenue on the west side of the lot where the election operations building stands. (April 9, 2024)

Campaign signs on College Avenue, looking north, on the west side of the lot where the election operations building stands. (April 9, 2024)

The demarcation of the 50-foot boundary, past which no campaigning is allowed, has been freshened up. (April 9, 2024)

Election operations at 3rd and Walnut streets.

The white board at Election Central says it all: 0 days until in-person early voting starts. (April 9, 2024)

At Election Central, supplies are ready to be picked up for use at different Election Day polling sites. (April 9, 2024)

In-person early voting for the May 7 primary election started in Monroe County at 8 a.m. Tuesday morning, at the county’s election operations building at 3rd and Walnut streets.

By noon, 26 people had cast their ballots, according to county election supervisor Kylie Moreland.

That’s a tiny fraction of the total number of registered voters in Monroe County, which as of noon stood at 91,161, according to Moreland.

The total number of registered voters will increase by the end of the day. That’s because a handful of people took advantage of the fact that the closure of county offices on Monday, due to the total solar eclipse, meant the deadline for registration was extended until noon Tuesday.

It is now too late to register in time to vote for the May 7 primary. Continue reading “In-person early voting starts in Monroe County for May 7 primary elections” →

Photos | April 8, 2024 Total Eclipse: Bloomington

Total Solar Eclipse Day, Monroe County courthouse, Bloomington, Indiana (April. 8, 2024) A haiku by ChatGPT: metal fish keeps watch / persimmon glow dims to night / moon then yields to sun