OurWeek The Grant County Record in Grant County · Regular meeting · 2025-04-15 · full transcript https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZlJ05RufUQ Exported Fri, 14 Aug 2026 22:40:43 GMT Source: YouTube automatic captions. Copied into the combined index from the marion-city-council-indexed report; same text, key prefixed by body. These transcripts are machine-generated. They garble proper nouns badly — company and personal names especially. Watch the recording before repeating any name, number, or quotation. The video is the record. ============================================================================== Indexed at https://ourweek.in/grant-county/reports/grant-county-record 1:29 Good evening and welcome to the Marian City Council meeting. Today is April 15th, 2025. It's 7 p.m. in the Marian 1:38 City Council chambers. Welcome everyone for being here. I would like to call this meeting to order, but begin with 1:46 prayer. Reverend Al Green from the Calvary Missionary Baptist Church. If you want to make your way up to the microphone, 1:59 go ahead and turn the microphone on. Let us pray. Lord, guide our city council member with wisdom and insight as they 2:09 deliberate tonight on the business of the city of Marian. May their decision be guided by justice, compassion, and 2:19 the well-being of the entire community as a whole. Give them the strength and courage to do what is right and good for 2:28 all of the citizen. I ask you Lord to forgive all the citizen of this community of their sin that they may 2:36 have committed. and I ask for your peace and unity among all that is present here in this place tonight. May God add a blessing upon you at this time. Amen. 2:50 Thank you, Reverend. And for the pledge, Councilman Mike Klein of the United States of America 3:01 and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. 3:14 Again, thank you, Reverend Green, for coming in tonight. And we're going to go in start with roll call. Madame Deputy Clerk 3:24 here. Marshall here. Ford here. Runner here. Klein here. Divine here. Whitten 3:31 here. Calgill here. Mckenley here. Tonight we're going to go right into the community 3:39 spotlight. Give me one moment here. And tonight we're spotlighting the Indiana Wesleyan University women's basketball 3:49 team. And uh ladies, if you want to go ahead and make your way up. Coach, the whole team, come on up. 3:58 Assistant, Dr. Jeff Reyes, come on up. 4:01 Anyone from IW, please just come all behind here and just you can spread out behind. There you go. 4:19 So, I have uh the honor to introduce the Indiana Western University women's basketball 4:25 team. They are the NIA National Runners Up. So, that deserves a round of applause right 4:35 there. That is not an easy feat. Uh I was tracking their progress all the way through and just couple close games 4:43 there got them all the way to that championship game and uh with a lot of grit and determination and the city of Marion is very proud of you. Um you guys 4:52 are integrated with our city, the campus Indiana Wesley University and I know uh from those of us at the city we're just 5:00 really really proud of you and happy that you're here tonight. Um so congratulations. I want to know who's all the seniors here tonight. 5:09 Okay, so we're losing a couple seniors and everybody's coming back next year, right? That can. Perfect. Okay, sounds 5:16 good. Um, well, we're just glad you chose Indiana Wesley and it's a wonderful university as you probably already know. And I just want to open it 5:25 up for Coach Ethan Whe if you have any comments. Can you come over here and you can you don't have to put all the way up there, but just kind of talk close to 5:32 it. Well, fortunately, I'm standing pretty close to it. Uh, no, I I just want to thank you guys. Thank you for having us. This is this is a huge honor. 5:41 Um, and and honestly, this is the first time I think we've all been back together since we were all crying in the locker room. And, um, you know, it's a 5:50 special thing uh for some of our seniors. I'm excited to see him again. 5:55 Some of them, you know, it was a really blessed two weeks away. Uh, just kidding. Um but no that you know we we 6:03 were fortunate to make it to the national championship. Uh I think we were 34 and three. Those things are special. Those things are exciting. But 6:11 what really made this year special um winning or losing that last game. It that the result had no bearing on that. 6:19 Um this was a group that was challenged coming in to be more hungry, to be tougher 6:26 because the talent wasn't the question mark. the unselfishness, the humility, and again the hunger. You mentioned 6:33 grit. I love that word to overcome hard things. And um as our staff was praying coming into this year, we didn't actually know how hard things would get. 6:46 Uh we battled injuries, we battled um one of our teammates leaving in the middle of the season, um illnesses, she 6:55 couldn't feel her legs for half the season. Um it it felt like every game there was a different obstacle and every 7:02 game there was someone else that that stepped up in a meaningful way. And as a coach, as a player, as anybody a part of 7:10 our program, those are the things that we're going to remember is not the wins per se, but the way that everybody just 7:18 came together and worked together. And you know, here at Indiana Wesley, one thing that we're so proud of as as a women's basketball program, but more importantly as an athletic department is 7:26 in a world of transfer portal and NIL, culture has kind of fallen by the 7:33 wayside. And again, I don't I don't want to act like Indiana wand women's basketball is the only culture strong culture at IU. It's not. Um but we're 7:42 really proud of the way that our culture kind of um allowed us to dig in and be 7:50 closer together. Again, accomplish something really special together that took years to build, not just 10 really 7:58 good players coming in for one year and then dipping. Um and and it's a special group. It was a special journey. Uh I 8:05 love these guys. They know that. Um so I'll leave you with that. But we we're very appreciative again for this opportunity. Appreciate for all you guys 8:13 do for our community. Uh we're here one time. You guys are here, you know, weekly, monthly. I'm not sure how long or how often. All the time. You never go 8:22 home. There's there's, you know, beds in here. But no, the uh we're so blessed. 8:26 I've lived in Marion for 17 years and and uh it's it's a great place to to live, great place to raise my family and I'm I'm proud to be a community member 8:35 here and I appreciate you guys. So, thank you. Thank you so much and those are some great words. I hope you can take a snippet off this YouTube and use it part of your recruitment material. 8:44 Say this came from the council meeting. So anyways, um congratulations again. 8:49 Just really proud of you. IW is such an integral part of our community. you're part of the fabric of our community and um we're just glad you're here and really proud of you and something that 8:58 you can share with your families and your kids generations from now and then um and then next year you can share that you won a national championship, right? 9:07 Yeah. Right. No pressure. Um anyways, thank you so much. We're going to get a photo with you. Yeah. Go ahead. Yeah. 9:16 [Applause] 9:19 Yeah. it. I want to echo everything and and man, you girls, did you hear what your coach just said? That that tells you how he feels about you guys and 9:27 that's why you guys are successful because of the way the coaches, the way you girls all come together. We are very proud. Yeah, everybody wanted to win. I get it. 9:37 Um getting there, man, what an accomplishment. That's what you need to be proud of. And I'm going to go ahead and announce that all the seniors, I'm 9:45 their agent. They're all going to be in the WB NBA. So, you know, but uh I'd probably get you in there. But anyway, very, very proud of you girls, honestly. 9:56 All right. Thank you. Any other council members? All right, let's get a photo. 10:00 If you want to kind of squeeze in here, Dr. Reyes, you got to be in this photo, too. You can't hide. Everybody get in 10:07 here. Squeeze in. And then I'll have my official photographer here. 11:35 And the exciting thing is that um I think it'll be done by next season, but they're going to have that new arena 11:42 um hopefully by next season. So, I'm super excited about that arena. It's already under construction and uh it's 11:50 going to be nice. Go ahead. Well, I you know, I've Debb and I have been a big huge supporter of IW sports for years and years and years and and I would just 11:59 if if the community if they've never been to an IW men or women's basketball game, they are really missing out. So, I 12:08 would invite the community to come out next year uh when the season opens and and attend some games. It's a it's a 12:15 it's a great time. And the and the coaches, they're not there to always win, but they're there to to 12:23 build a a team and camaraderie and and 12:32 to win souls for the Lord. They really are. That's what That's what it's all about. Thank you. Thank you for that. 12:43 All right. Uh we don't have a city employee spotlight. I think we'll have one next meeting. Um, not one today though. So, we're going to move into consent agenda. Hopefully, everyone had 12:52 an opportunity to review everything. And if I could get a motion, I would take that. Make a motion to approve the 13:00 consent agenda. Second. Motion by Councilwoman Divine, a second by Councilman Kaine. Any 13:09 discussion? Madame Deputy Clerk, roll call. 13:14 Kane, I Marshall, hi. Ford, hi. Runner, I Klene, yes. Divine. Yes. Whitten. Yes. 13:23 Cowgill. Hi. McKinley. Yes. 13:27 Moving into committee reports. Do we have any committee reports? 13:35 Fish. I have a short one while she's Go ahead. preparing. Uh couple of highlights from the April 3rd board of 13:41 airport board of aviation commissioners meeting at the airport. The construction on the new approach lighting is complete 13:49 and the FAA's tenatively scheduled its flight check for next week. And you might recall last report there were no 13:58 bids on the fuel farm design and construction the first time around. So, uh, they're opening up again bids for 14:07 the construction plans, the specs, and the contracts. Uh, the pre-bid meeting was last Thursday, and the bids are 14:14 scheduled to be open at 2:00 on the 25th, and they're working on a backup plan in case there's another 14:22 uh, poor bid response. All this is for installation of a jet A fuel system and 14:28 a 100 octane low fuel system. and the city through uh uh some funding is 14:37 helping to pay for that. That's all I got. Your turn. Thank you, Councilwoman Devon. 14:47 Okay. The border works met um last week because of the three-w weekek gap in there. Everything we're off schedule, 14:55 but I think in May it goes back to working out. Um they did some uh swearins of new officers uh Troy Vice, 15:04 Danny Nally, Anthony McClung, and Luke Gordon. 15:09 Um there was an amendment made to the scoping agreement for the downtown fire station which was approved. Um the 15:18 backhoe that was set up to be purchased for the street department, those the low bid was approved for that. Um, a storage 15:27 building purchase for the parks department was also approved. And then, um, a department vehicle for the fire 15:35 department. And then, um, I think it was two vehicles for code enforcement. Those were all approved by the board of works through the capital improvement plan. 15:44 And then, um, they discussed unsafe structures, which they've been doing, um, at most meetings. The board did not do any additional um approvals for demo. 15:56 They are um I think working with building commissioner Fosnite to work through some uh conversations about 16:05 priorities and they're they're thinking ahead to what happens when money runs out. How do we make sure that um 16:12 everything's getting um put into a proper pipeline so that we can get the most 16:18 um the most needed ones removed versus just running down a full list. And so I know they're working on that and I I 16:27 from what I understood they were going to uh I think um the chair Alex Husky was going to meet with the mayor and with uh Mr. FOS night to kind of work 16:36 out through some plans and to to get kind of a game plan in place so that moving forward uh with the money that they're given 16:44 each year they can continue to to work on that blight as um they don't get quite the amount of money that they've 16:50 got in the last two years. So that's been going on with the border works. Um, we also had a public works committee 16:59 meeting last week on uh the alley vacate request that was brought to us. Um, that 17:06 was given a favorable recommendation and will be brought to us at the next meeting. Um, and that was to allow the 17:15 alley, I forget where it was, to go back to the property owners. It was pretty much three owners in a whole area and it was all uh grass. So, it was not a 17:25 developed alley. Um, and then we had the one today that everybody attended, so I don't need to go over that, I assume. But just make 17:33 sure you get all that feedback back to me. 17:37 Great. Thanks. For anyone watching at home or didn't watch um that committee meeting for the public works on the alleys is there going to be another 17:45 meeting scheduled. It's just more conversation. So, it's not coming back to the full agenda at this point. Okay. 17:51 Any other committee reports? Yeah, Councilman Brunner, we had a park board meeting and the big thing uh from that 17:59 came we've got the dog park finally put together and if you didn't uh see the pictures in the paper and the things 18:05 that were going on, uh we have uh have a a community that I think is very friendly to dogs. There's a lot of 18:13 people that have dogs and uh the the dog park's going to make it a lot more uh easy for them to get out and get some 18:20 fresh air and get a little exercise for their their pets. So, we uh really are happy about that. 18:28 Thanks, Councilman Brunner. I'm going to add on to like the parks board. 18:32 Um so, the skate park that we're we've just been looking at. I just wanted to make the public aware that there is a 18:40 community input meeting, public input meeting next Wednesday, April 23rd at 6 PM right here in the council chambers. 18:47 Hunger skate parks is the one that's been designing. We have a 2D design. It's been released. It's on Facebook. 18:54 It's on the internet, but there will be a public meeting here next Wednesday, April 23rd, 6 PM open to the public to give feedback on the skate park. Um, so 19:02 we can knock down and nail down a design and then get a price. So, it's kind of tagging on to the parks department 19:09 there. Any other committee reports? Okay, we're going to move into unfinished business. Starting with 19:17 general ordinance 6-2025, compensation for members of Mary Utility Service Board, second reading, public hearing. 19:27 An ordinance increasing the compensation for the Marian Utility Service Board members. Members of the Marian Utility Service Board receive a small salary to 19:35 cover out-of-pocket expenses. They may occur in the performance of their duties as board members. The last salary adjustment was made in 1995. We request 19:44 the council consider an increase of $1,000 for each board position as presented in resolution 3, 2024. 19:52 Speaking mayor and utilities director Robin Shrader. 19:57 Good evening. Good evening. Glad to be here again. I'll just uh reiterate this is pretty straightforward, but um since 20:05 1995, the annual salary of the chairman of the board has been $2,500 and we would like to recommend 20:13 that go to 3500. The other board members have been an annual salary of 2,000 and we would like to make that 3,000. So we 20:22 have seven board members in total. So that's an increase of just $7,000. 20:29 Any council members with questions? If not, then we'll go to the public 20:38 hearing. If you would like to speak on this, please make your way to the 20:47 microphone. All right. I'm not seeing anyone make their way to the microphone, so we'll go ahead and close the public 20:55 hearing. Any council members with any discussion or questions? If not, I'd entertain a 21:02 motion. Mr. President, go ahead. I move that we suspend the rules on general ordinance number six, 2025. 21:11 Second. Motion to suspend the rules by Councilman Kaine, a second by Councilman Cowgill. Any discussion? 21:19 Madame Deputy Clerk, roll call. Kane, I. Marshall, I. Forice. I Runner. I Klene. 21:28 Yes, Divine. Yes, Whitten. Yes, Calgill. I Mckenley. 21:34 Yes. Rules have been suspended. I would entertain another motion. Mr. President, I move that we pass general ordinance number 6, 2025. 21:44 Second. 21:46 Motion to pass general ordinance 6, 2025 by Councilman Kaine, second by Councilman Calgill. Any discussion? 21:55 Madam Deputy Clerk, roll call. Kane, I. Marshall, I. Forice, I. Runner, I. 22:03 Klene, yes. Divine. Yes. Whitten. Yes. 22:07 Calgill. I. McKinley. Yes. General Ordinance 6-2025 has passed. Moving on 22:14 to general ordinance 7-2025, an ordinance amending general ordinance 32193. Second reading and public hearing. 22:24 An ordinance making the utility board a nonpartisan board. The Maring Utility Service Board is currently a partisan board that requires candidates to be 22:32 selected based on the two-party political system. The utility board should be a nonpartisan board that is selected based on merit and experience. 22:40 This current system also alienates independent voters or candidates that might vote for different political parties in the separate national and local election cycles. 22:50 Speaking Council President Nick McKinley. 22:54 Yes. Um I addressed this last meeting. I think the executive summary sums it up best. So if there's no questions by the 23:01 council members, then I would open it up to the public hearing. You would like to speak, make your way up to the microphone, state 23:09 your name and address, and you have three minutes. Turn your microphone on. 23:18 Bill Cree 1409 Ironwood here in Marian. 23:24 Um I support putting a qualified associate in every position while cultivating an environment that 23:32 encourages diversity of thought and avoid avoids creating an echo chamber. 23:39 Changes made though with the best intentions sometimes have unexpected consequences without guard rails. And I 23:48 could just see at some point this becoming totally partisan because you're opening it up to 23:56 anything. And I don't mean to be nefarious, but sometimes the best intentions, just like I know this is a 24:03 extreme, but with the Patriot Act, it all sounded good and then it got taken to a different level. But if you open it 24:13 up, you could have all one thought or one party control 24:21 it. And while that may not seem like that would ever happen, I just ask you 24:29 to maybe consider putting the proper guard rails in place to keep that from happening because I think it's a great 24:36 idea. I think it it is very inclusive, but just be careful that you don't open up opportunity for somebody down the 24:45 road, not necessarily here, but in the future. So just that's that's my only thought on that. 24:53 Thank you. Thank you. 24:59 Welcome. State your name, address, and you have three minutes. Linda Wilk, 1016 West Fifth Street. I agree. It should be nonpartisan. I frankly think city 25:07 council should be nonpartisan in all county at the county level because I really feel like to have Republican, Democrat, it should be the best person. 25:15 So thank you. Thank you. 25:21 Public meeting still open. Public hearing. Anyone want to speak? I don't see anyone moving. So, 25:30 we'll close the public hearing. Any council members, questions, input, comments? 25:39 Mr. President, go ahead. I I did a little bit of research and went back while probably went 25:46 back 35 40 years asked questions. Has this been ever been a problem with politics on the utility board? 25:58 And the response was no, it never has. 26:02 So I'm pretty confident that uh moving moving forward this won't be a problem. 26:08 If it is, we'll address it at that point in time. Thank you. 26:12 I appreciate that input and I agree. If it became a problem, we have the rights to come back and put that back in place, 26:20 change it. So, and you know, the they I will let the public know that utility board isn't just all the mayor's picks. 26:28 So, the council gets some picks, the mayor gets picks. So, it is a diverse group um of selections with alternating 26:36 um rotating seats. they're not all appointed at the same time. So, I think that's kind of what helps kind of break that up. Um, you have different council 26:44 elections that might change who gets chosen for uh those seats that the council fills. You have different mayoral elections that they get to 26:53 choose different per people to fill as well. So, I think that rotation there is is pretty good. If it was all at one time, maybe I'd have a little, you know, 27:01 then you stack it all at one time, but the the way the system's now, I think it's in a good good spot. So, any other questions, 27:11 comments? If not, I would entertain a motion. Mr. President, I would like to uh make a motion that we suspend the rules on general ordinance 7, 2025. 27:22 Second. Motion to suspend the rules by Councilman Cowgill, a second by Councilman Brunner. Any 27:32 discussion? Madame Deputy Clerk, roll call. Kane. Hi. Marshall. Hi. Forice. Hi. 27:40 Runner. Hi. Klene. Yes. Divine. Yes. Whitten. Yes. Calgill. I. McKinley. Yes. 27:48 Rules have been suspended for general ordinance 72025. I'd entertain another motion. Mr. President, I now move that we pass general ordinance uh 72025. 28:01 Second. Motion by Councilman Calgill to pass general ordinance 72025. Second by Councilman Brunner. Any other discussion? 28:10 Madame Deputy Clerk. Roll call. Kain. I. Marshall. Hi. Forice. Hi. 28:17 Runner. I. Klene. Yes. Divine. Yes. Whitten. Yes. Calgill. Hi. McKinley. 28:25 Yes. Agenda ordinance 72025 is passed. 28:31 Moving on to general ordinance 9-2025, an ordinance for political signs, second reading and public hearing. 28:40 An ordinance addressing political signs. 28:43 This ordinance is to amend an existing ordinance to allow for political signs to be placed in the city rightofway property without obstructing vehicular 28:50 traffic visibility. The current ordinance does not allow signs to be placed in the rightway property located in front of someone's property. Speaking Council President Nick McKinley. 29:04 Well, I think that executive summary was well written because I wrote it. It's like who writes your own story? It's always good. Um, we have fun here. So, 29:13 yeah. I mean, this was something that uh when I was campaigning, I just had a major issue with. I don't want to beat a dead horse. I just think if I have to 29:22 mow it, I should be able to put a sign there. If I can put a realer sign there, I should be able to put a political sign there. It continues on and on. There 29:30 are, like I said in the ordinance, some stipulations to have it a certain distance from the curb. Um, it can't be 29:36 obstructing view. Um, so if there is a complaint, say the police department gets a complaint or the police department is at an intersection and 29:44 there's a political sign blocking view, then that ordinance allows them to address that with that resident and say, "You need to move that. It's got to be 29:51 offset a certain amount of feet." So, there's some safety precautions in that as well. So, uh, any council members want to add anything before we go to 30:00 public hearing. Okay, we'll go ahead and open public 30:07 hearing. If you'd like to say something, you can make your way up. You guys are making it easy tonight. 30:17 Nobody's making their way to the microphone, so we'll close the public hearing. Any last comments or questions 30:24 from council members? Mr. President, I don't know if Donald Trump's running in another term, but I've seen Donald Trump signs all over Marian still, so I didn't 30:32 know if people were putting those back up or not, but uh it's probably time to take some of those down. Well, my advice would be to download the City of Marion 30:41 app and you can file a code enforcement complaint through the City of Marion app because it actually is out of compliance. Uh there you have to have 30:49 the signs down. um you know within 15 days of the election. So if you still have your campaign sent out in your 30:57 yard, you probably want to take that down before Jim downloads the app and makes a 31:04 complaint. Uh okay. Anything else? All right. If not, I would entertain a motion. Mr. President, uh I 31:13 would like to make a motion on this very well-ritten summary on general ordinance number 925. I'd like to suspend the rules. 31:22 Uh motion to suspend the rules by Councilman Calgill. A second by Councilman Kaine. Any other discussion? 31:30 Madame Deputy Clerk, roll call. Kain. I. Marshall. Hi. Forice. Hi. Runner. Hi. 31:38 Klene. Yes. Divine. Yes. Whitten. Yes. 31:41 Calgill. Hi. Mckenley. Yes. Rules have been suspended. I would entertain another motion. Mr. President, I would 31:48 now like to make a motion that we pass this very well-written summary, general ordinance number 9, 2025. Second. 31:57 Motion by Councilman Calgill to pass general ordinance 92025. Second by Councilman Kaine. Any other 32:07 discussion? Madame Deputy Clerk, roll call. Kane, I. Marshall, I 32:14 Runner. I Klene. Yes. Divine, yes. Whitten, yes. Calgill, hi. 32:21 McKinley, yes. General ordinance 9-2025 is passed. I thank the council for the 32:28 unanimous support on both of those uh ordinances that I've brought forward. 32:33 Moving into new business, uh there was additional appropriation 4-2025 first reading um that was requesting $250,000 32:42 for more balite elimination, but in light of Senate Bill one that was just signed in law today reducing property 32:49 taxes, um the mayor has requested that I table this for now so we can get a better analysis of how that's going to 32:57 impact the city so we can um maybe have a little more of a plan on what that's going to do to our 33:06 expenditures in three years. So, I'm going to go ahead and table that um since we haven't gotten through a first reading yet and mayor will bring it back 33:13 when he's ready. And so, that's it for new business announcements. Uh just another reminder, the splash pad groundbreaking is April 21st at noon. 33:25 And again, a reminder, the skate park public input session will be April 23rd at 6 PM right here in the council 33:32 chambers. I will be here. Hunger skate parks will be here and they'll be presenting the design or the initial design for that and getting input on any 33:41 tweaks they need from that. Any other council members with announcements? 33:45 The Earth Day is going to be on the 24th at the park along with the story walk uh grand opening at 4:30. Thank you. 33:57 All right. What day is that again? April 24th. Okay. Thursday. Thank you. So, I've got it right here. Uh story walk. 34:06 Enjoy a story together as you walk through the park. Ribbon cutting ceremony. April 24th at 4:30 p.m. by the pond at Mater Park. There you go. 34:16 Councilman Klein. Got you. Any other announcements? Okay. I would entertain a motion. 34:25 Mr. President, I move that we adjourn this meeting. 34:30 Motion to adjourn by Councilman Kaine, a second by Councilman Klene. Any other discussion? Madame Deputy Clerk, roll 34:37 call. Kaine. I. Marshall. I. Four. Hi Runner. Hi Klein. Yes. Divine. Yes. 34:44 Whitten. Yes. Calgill. Hi. McKinley. 34:47 Yes. We are ajourned. Thank you for coming.