The Press-Dispatch
Issue link: https://www.ifoldsflip.com/i/1449492
B-4 Wednesday, Feburar y 9, 2022 The Press-Dispatch Submit East Gibson news items: Call: 812-354-8500 Email: egnews@pressdispatch.net or bring in a hard copy: 820 E. Poplar Street, Petersburg EAST GIBSON Commissioners seek on-track wait times for trains By Janice Barniak Commissioners blew the whistle on blocked railroad crossing con- cerns in their meeting last week, but other than inviting the railroads to their monthly meetings were un- sure how to get traction addressing the issues. Recently CR 350 and around the county highway garage has been blocked. Several years ago, the county tried ticketing the trains that stayed longer than 10 minutes blocking a road, but the Indiana Supreme Court threw out those tickets. "We went through this a year and a half to two years ago," said Sher- iff Tim Bottoms. "We tried to deal with it, to ticket them for more than 10 minutes...they can do what they want." The county's highway workers have experienced trains blocking roads — the same train — for an entire eight hour shift. Moreover, the highway department would like to use the most direct route when hauling heavy rock for example. "The bottom line is it's a safety concern for us," said Commission- er Warren Fleetwood, who said emergency services do not know a railroad crossing is blocked until they're at the crossing, when min- utes count. "There are times it makes a differ- ence between life and death," said Gibson County EMS Director David Pond. "The longer they're there, the more it increases our chances of run- ning into them there." Commissioner Kenneth Mont- gomery said when the train blocks Toyota traffic he's seen workers turn around in the middle of Ind. 64, go down CR400 or CR450. "Complain all you want but you're not going to do anything against the railroad," said Montgomery. "The government is not going to let you do anything." Local Bill Tuley agreed. "A fter 38 years on the railroad, all I can say is, 'Good luck.'" Fire devastates Oakland City home A crew turned off power lines to a still-smoking house fire at 10144 E. CR125S in Oakland City Monday, where the night before a home burned down. Highway crews work overtime to clear roads for safety By Janice Barniak Bad weather cancelled Gibson County schools Thursday and Fri- day of last week, but according to Gibson County Highway Dept. Di- rector, Brant Johnson, good prepa- ration lead to good results for the local workers. Wednesday workers had an eye on roads, watching for snowfall, and had already prepped the salt and sand mix they use on roads. Once the snow arrived, they worked approximately 11-13 hours Thursday. "They worked all day Thurs- day, then at 4 a.m. Friday morn- ing the guys came right back in, and plowed until 3:30 p.m.," John- son said. As for going into this week, crews were letting the sunshine take effect, plowing off some slush, and "letting mother nature take her course," he said. The department has plenty of salt and sand for the season, he added, should that course turn snowy again. "We are about as prepared as you can be," Johnson said. "Pretty much everybody did a heck of a job making things safe on the coun- ty roads." Jail completion pushed back By Janice Barniak The completion timeline for Gibson County's new jail has been pushed back from June to Decem- ber of 2023 last week, reported owner's representative, George Ballard, to Gibson County Com- missioners. The delay is due to land acqui- sition issues, and while the land is "98 percent" acquired, Ballard said the project is also affected by sup- ply difficulties for example, in get- ting roofing materials. Ballard submitted the new time- line to the federal court tracking jail construction as part of set- tling lawsuits brought by the AC- LU against Gibson County. "We turned in this report last Monday...if we don't hear any- thing that's generally good," Bal- lard said. Meanwhile, commissioners agreed to a contract with RQAW, the jail design firm. Commissioner, Warren Fleetwood, said the com- pany made three pages of changes during negotiations and has been responsive to their requests. Commissioners also plan to sign a memorandum of understanding with the city of Princeton, saying they will install a grinder and lim- it the height of the jail to 30 feet or less. EMS request pay for every hour worked By Janice Barniak Securitas Fire Chief Bob Beebe, who works for Toyota Motor Man- ufacturing of Indiana, told commis- sioners he relies on Gibson County Emergency Medical Services "100 percent" and was surprised to dis- cover that the county's paramed- ics, with the highest level of edu- cation, made the equivalent of what his much less experienced EMTs make as their starting pay, $19.36 an hour, despite their being two lev- els of education below paramedics. "I have never come from a ser- vice that didn't take care of your ad- vance-level providers," he said, add- ing he has more than 30 years ex- perience. Out of 86 EMS incidents at TMMI, the team depended on Gib- son County EMS for 47 of them. Gibson County EMS Director, David Pond, invited Beebe to the meeting to discuss the state of EMS with commissioners; EMS and commissioners are currently nego- tiating a contract and the EMS has asked that instead of paying 16 of their 24 hour shifts, that the coun- ty pay every hour. Beebe said when he worked those 16 of 24s as a young emer- gency responder, it caused difficul- ties, not the least of which was hav- ing to take 24 hours P TO to take a day off. "In this day and age, when EMS is being, I guess I don't want to say run into the ground, but it's run in- to the ground. There's not a lot of people stepping up to go to EMT school," Pond told commissioners. Beebe said when his workers take a 24 hour shift they're paid for 24 hours, and he feels that has led to not having morale issues. In other ambulance service news, Pond told commissioners that with the hospital raising rent from $ 625 per month to proposing $2100 a month, the county should consider building a new ambulance base. The current facility is in bad shape he said, and the service is growing. A North Gibson School official suggested the old Franklin school might be a possibility. He said he'd like to take plans to the Gibson County redevelopment board. Commissioners said they'd like to see his plans and have him fill out the paperwork necessary to ap- proach redevelopment. Divided commission passes union contract By Janice Barniak Gibson County Commissioners passed a contract for the highway department and clerical employees in their Feb. 1 meeting, but the vote was split with Commissioner Mary Key dissenting. "I requested a full copy of the con- tract and I haven't received it," she told fellow commissioners. "I do still have some concerns." The contract has been the subject of debate between County Commis- sioners, whose job it is to negotiate with the Teamsters union that rep- resents county employees, and the Gibson County Council, who are the financial arm of the county. According to the County Coun- cil in previous meetings, especially Council President Jeremy Overton, the taxpayers lost in negotiations be- cause the county did not get conces- sions from the union, but expanded benefits including adding two holi- days, changing the way bereavement is taken, and not requiring a doctor's note for more than three sick days. In the long run, he predicted de- partment managers would face more challenges filling shifts and there would be unseen costs to the contract. On the other hand, Commission- er Kenneth Montgomery, who nego- tiated with Teamsters and is a for- mer Gibson County Highway Dept. worker, said he thought the contract made up for benefits that had been cut earlier in leaner times, and said in the previous meeting that he re- fused to renegotiate or participate in meetings with the County Council to renegotiate. The County Council has budgeted a raise for county employees, but has not yet approved the raise, saying they had wanted to be apprised of the nego- tiations as they were happening, and wanted to evaluate the potential costs of concessions. The contract is for 2022, this year, and contracts for other county em- ployees, for example, emergency medical services, have not yet fin- ished negotiations. "I can't vote for it at this time, be- cause I have concerns. I want to see these guys get a raise and the coun- cil has full control of the money," said Key.