CHURUBUSCO, Ind. (Nov. 22, 2009) — At their Wednesday, Nov. 18, meeting the town council approved, 2-0, a one percent salary increase for all employees except elected positions. Vivian Sade voted against the increase.

Churubusco Town Hall

No decision was made on a recommendation to advance two employees up a level on the the pay scale, raising the hourly wages of deputy clerk from $16.12 to $18.73 and the hourly wages of street department worker from $13.36 to $16.04.

The council voted unanimously to proceed with annexing the southeast side of U.S. 33 from Mahle Corp. and McDonalds south to CR 375 N. Sade said she was reluctant to vote for the annexation unless the council had something in writing that would show a plan – with dates, phases  and a timeline – for annexing the southwest side of U.S. 33, as well.

“I understand the concerns of the business owners who spoke up (at the annexation hearing),” We need to show that we are proactive in coming up with a plan for the entire south side instead of just doing the east side because we can, because it’s the easiest,” Sade said. “And if I were a small business owner, I would say the same things those business owners told us in that meeting – it’s a large percent increase on their taxes and they are already getting the town’s services.”

“We can never grow as a town if we don’t do this,” said Frank Kessler, council president. “It’s something that should have been done years ago by another council and now it’s been thrown in our laps. If we don’t do it, then it will just keep getting put off.”

Hart agreed and said the most logical place to grow was to the south since there were businesses and homeowners south of C.R. 375 who had expressed interest in receving town services whenever they became available. “But we have to take it one step at a time and we have to start here,” Hart said.

Sade said that by expanding the town base, it would hopefully prevent “sticking it to the same 600 or so meter holders that have always taken the hit on rate increases.”

According to Kessler, there is a 90-day remonstrance period before the council can move forward with the annexation.

In other council business:

• The council approved the purchase of a new police squad car. The police department is budgeted on a 2-year plan for purchasing vehicles. The department has always ordered Ford Crown Victorias, but Ford will quit making that model in 2011, according to Town Marshal Chad Fulkerson. He plans to order a Dodge. He said both models are priced at $21,000-$22,000.
• The town agreed to have a copy of the park’s usage contracts with the school and Churubusco Youth League to the town’s attorney for review. Pat Stanford, park board president,  confirmed that the CYL has experienced  financial troubles this year and the town was shorted on the leasing monies. “We have taken steps to see that this does not happen next year and that the town receives the contracted amount in April,” Stanford said. Apparently there were poor spending decisions made, Stanford said, and no one discovered – until it was too late – that the CYL was in serious financial straits. The town park contracts with the CYL and is supposed to receive $10 per youth league player, but the amount was negotiated down to $500 for 2009 when it was discovered that the CYL could not pay the full amount. “Even at $10 a kid, that works out to only about 55 or 60 cents per game that we receive,” said Rick Krider, superintendent of the park. “We certainly use more than that to maintain the fields, keep the lights on and everything else.”