Posted on March 21, 2018
Author Jacque Ryan, WKVI
A bank stabilization pilot project that was recently conducted on the Yellow River was discussed during last Thursday’s Kankakee River Basin Commission meeting.
Starke County Surveyor Bill Crase said that about 2200 feet of work was completed along both sides of the river. He told commission members that he was very impressed with the results, especially with the way the banks were able to withstand recent flooding.
He said only about 300 feet of damage was incurred and suspected that was likely from floating debris striking the spot rather than structural inefficiencies. However, there were certain issues with the way that the project that kept Crase from considering it a complete success.
“We had a successful project but at the end of the day, the cost per foot made it unsuccessful on paper. If we are going to consider carrying on with that project, we have to have our local people do it.” Crase explained, “We can not bring in big companies for big dollars with that kind of money per foot or we’re never going to get anything done.”
Crase said he was under the impression that local businesses would be utilized for aspects of the project since it was mentioned in the agreement and he was instructed to submit an approved list of local companies on more than one occasion. However, the North Carolina-based consulting firm North States Environmental reportedly went out of county for much of the work.
A few different examples were provided, but one instance Crase referenced was a time where a larger excavator was required. Crase said he offered up a local contractor who was willing to rent an excavator that could have been used right away but the firm decided to rent the equipment from a company out of the area and had to wait two weeks for it to come in.
Since the project was started late in the fall, Crase said there wasn’t really an opportunity for them to stop the work in order to address the consulting issues due to time constraints. He added that the anticipated cost of the project was expected to be about $300,000 and it came in a bit over $500,000.
Commission Secretary and Jasper County Surveyor Vince Urbano stated that as a representative of the commission and a county surveyor he was dismayed to hear that the size of the project could have potentially been doubled for the same price, had local help been utilized.
Commission Treasurer Kevin Breitzke said though the KRBC isn’t involved with creating the contract, he was upset to learn that local workers were not utilized or trained since they were told that they would be. Vice Chairman Ken Purze stressed the fact that the KRBC is a funding source and that project supervision is out of their control. He said that responsibility falls to the individual county surveyors and drainage boards.
Though the discussion got a bit heated with various county officials weighing in on the perceived failures or coming to the defense of the KRBC, Crase ended his report saying that it doesn’t do any good to sit and argue about it now. He stated that the purpose of his report was to highlight the pros and alert commission members of the cons.
He added that if the KRBC does plan to fund similar bank stabilization projects in other counties, officials now know that the utilization of local workers and the importance of maintaining individual project control will need to be emphasized as an absolute requirement in order to keep any future projects from facing the same problems.
Chairman Chris Knochel thanked Starke County Surveyor Crase for his report and said this pilot project has served as a valuable learning opportunity for the commission members.
Showing posts with label Starke County Surveyor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Starke County Surveyor. Show all posts
Wednesday, March 21, 2018
Tuesday, March 6, 2018
Starke County Surveyor Thanks Local Farmers For Stepping Up to Help Out With Flood Response
Posted on March 6, 2018
Author Jacque Ryan, WKVI
According to Starke County Surveyor Bill Crase, four breached levees in the Starke County and La Porte County areas have recently been fixed, while work on one site is being postponed due to the current levels of the Kankakee River.
Surveyor Crase explained that while working on the final section of a levee, workers realized that the river wasn’t dropping. He said if they sealed it up, the pressure would have caused the water to burst out elsewhere so they weren’t able to fix it just yet. While they have slowed the breach down a bit, Crase said crews continue to monitor the spot and are waiting for the river to drop before patching it up any further.
Additionally, crews have been working to assist the DNR with flood response. He said over the last few days, they’ve been helping them out at the Kankakee Fish and Wildlife Preserve to fix a few areas inside that were causing major flooding on Highway 8. He said just yesterday, they were working on a problem spot in the Yellow River behind DNR Headquarters to fix a breach there.
Crase mentioned that all the flood response work that’s been completed lately could not have been done without the help of a number of local volunteers who have been pitching in.
He explained, “We’ve had several of our area farmers step up and help through this process. They’ve assisted the county and assisted the DNR and individuals who came out to help carry sandbags…”
Aside from local farmers and volunteers, members of the Starke County Highway Department and many businesses including Beck’s seed company, Dirt Works, NISPCO and the Starke County Co-Op have provided assistance as well. Crase extended major gratitude to everyone willing to sacrifice their time and effort to help with the response.
Author Jacque Ryan, WKVI
According to Starke County Surveyor Bill Crase, four breached levees in the Starke County and La Porte County areas have recently been fixed, while work on one site is being postponed due to the current levels of the Kankakee River.
Surveyor Crase explained that while working on the final section of a levee, workers realized that the river wasn’t dropping. He said if they sealed it up, the pressure would have caused the water to burst out elsewhere so they weren’t able to fix it just yet. While they have slowed the breach down a bit, Crase said crews continue to monitor the spot and are waiting for the river to drop before patching it up any further.
Additionally, crews have been working to assist the DNR with flood response. He said over the last few days, they’ve been helping them out at the Kankakee Fish and Wildlife Preserve to fix a few areas inside that were causing major flooding on Highway 8. He said just yesterday, they were working on a problem spot in the Yellow River behind DNR Headquarters to fix a breach there.
Crase mentioned that all the flood response work that’s been completed lately could not have been done without the help of a number of local volunteers who have been pitching in.
He explained, “We’ve had several of our area farmers step up and help through this process. They’ve assisted the county and assisted the DNR and individuals who came out to help carry sandbags…”
Aside from local farmers and volunteers, members of the Starke County Highway Department and many businesses including Beck’s seed company, Dirt Works, NISPCO and the Starke County Co-Op have provided assistance as well. Crase extended major gratitude to everyone willing to sacrifice their time and effort to help with the response.
Tuesday, February 27, 2018
Starke County Surveyor Warns Residents to Be Aware of Potential Scams
Posted on February 27, 2018
Author Jacque Ryan, WKVI
Starke County Surveyor Bill Crase is warning residents to be aware of potential scammers looking to take advantage of people during flood recovery.
Last Friday, the surveyor’s office received a call from an individual reporting that two men in a U-Haul truck drove up to his residence and told him they were from the county surveyor’s office.
They reportedly said they were replacing a culvert nearby and told the resident he needed to write them a check since it was on his property. Fortunately, the individual called the surveyor’s office and was alerted that surveyor crews will never come and demand money from you for any reason.
If you ever come across a suspicious situation such as this, feel free to contact the Starke County Surveyor’s Office with any questions at 574-772-9135 or report the incident to local authorities.
Author Jacque Ryan, WKVI
Starke County Surveyor Bill Crase is warning residents to be aware of potential scammers looking to take advantage of people during flood recovery.
Last Friday, the surveyor’s office received a call from an individual reporting that two men in a U-Haul truck drove up to his residence and told him they were from the county surveyor’s office.
They reportedly said they were replacing a culvert nearby and told the resident he needed to write them a check since it was on his property. Fortunately, the individual called the surveyor’s office and was alerted that surveyor crews will never come and demand money from you for any reason.
If you ever come across a suspicious situation such as this, feel free to contact the Starke County Surveyor’s Office with any questions at 574-772-9135 or report the incident to local authorities.
Tuesday, November 1, 2016
Metro Recycling Responds to Residents’ Concerns with North Judson Transfer Station
Posted on November 1, 2016
Author Michael Gallenberger, WKVI
Concerns with a recycling transfer station planned for the North Judson area have led to a response from the company, as well as local economic development officials. Metro Recycling is currently moving ahead with a permitting process with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management. The company plans to add a recycling transfer station on Oakwood Street in the North Judson Industrial Park.
Metro Recycling CEO Neil Samahon says the transfer station will handle municipal solid waste. Meanwhile, asbestos, PCBs, hazardous waste, lead-acid batteries, tires, infectious waste, and bio-medical waste will all be prohibited from the facility, according to its IDEM application.
Starke County Economic Development Foundation Executive Director Charlie Weaver says the transfer station will actually be cleaner than other recycling centers around the county and more controlled than the Richard’s Disposal facility already in North Judson. “They’ve got things that they transfer between gondolas,” Weaver says. “They’ve got stuff that they dump on the open ground. And the people of North Judson are perfectly happy with that because they don’t think it bothers them. [Metro Recycling is] putting it on concrete with drains, where the drainage is going to be controlled, filtered, it’s going to go through oil separators and everything else and monitored.”
Weaver and Samahon note that the majority of the operations will take place indoors. Samahon adds that the waste received at the facility will generally come from within a 25-mile radius. Once it arrives, it will only be allowed to stay at the transfer station for a maximum of 24 hours. “That garbage has to turn around and go,” he says. “This isn’t a landfill. This isn’t somewhere where we can sit on garbage. It literally is a transfer station. The garbage comes in, and then it gets loaded into a transfer trailer, then goes out, and it heads to the landfill.”
Weaver says that before planning on the North Judson transfer station got underway, he arranged for several local officials to tour Metro Recycling’s existing facilities. “I then approached Ted Bombagetti, who was the director of emergency management in Starke County; Terry Stephenson, director of the county planning commission; and Dennis Estok, who was county surveyor at the time,” Weaver says. “They toured the facilities, and came back and reported to me that they were very clean. They were extremely impressed with the facilities. They were very neat and orderly, very clean. There was no junk laying around.” Weaver also notes that while steps are being taken to protect the local environment, the site of the proposed North Judson transfer station has been an industrial area for well over a century.
Samahon adds that a big goal of Metro Recycling is to help protect the environment by reducing the amount of garbage that ends up in landfills. “I’m not sure when it was bad to try to recycle,” he says. “And that’s the part that I don’t want to say frustrates me but I just kind of question. We’re trying to offer a benefit to the community by taking items because if it isn’t for facilities that are recycling, then we need to set aside more land for landfills, and I don’t think anybody’s going to be too happy about that.”
Samahon estimates that the new transfer station would create about five jobs initially. That could eventually increase to up to 15, depending on the success of the facility.
Metro Recycling plans to discuss the proposed facility with residents during Monday’s North Judson Town Council meeting at 6:30 p.m. Town officials have announced that Monday’s meeting has been moved to the North Judson–San Pierre Junior/Senior High School Auditorium. The presentation will be for informational purposes only, since the proposed site actually sits outside of the North Judson town limits and out of the town council’s jurisdiction. However, Weaver says council members have been involved in the project for at least the past year.
If the process continues to move along as scheduled, the new transfer station could open in the summer of 2017.
Author Michael Gallenberger, WKVI
Concerns with a recycling transfer station planned for the North Judson area have led to a response from the company, as well as local economic development officials. Metro Recycling is currently moving ahead with a permitting process with the Indiana Department of Environmental Management. The company plans to add a recycling transfer station on Oakwood Street in the North Judson Industrial Park.
Metro Recycling CEO Neil Samahon says the transfer station will handle municipal solid waste. Meanwhile, asbestos, PCBs, hazardous waste, lead-acid batteries, tires, infectious waste, and bio-medical waste will all be prohibited from the facility, according to its IDEM application.
Starke County Economic Development Foundation Executive Director Charlie Weaver says the transfer station will actually be cleaner than other recycling centers around the county and more controlled than the Richard’s Disposal facility already in North Judson. “They’ve got things that they transfer between gondolas,” Weaver says. “They’ve got stuff that they dump on the open ground. And the people of North Judson are perfectly happy with that because they don’t think it bothers them. [Metro Recycling is] putting it on concrete with drains, where the drainage is going to be controlled, filtered, it’s going to go through oil separators and everything else and monitored.”
Weaver and Samahon note that the majority of the operations will take place indoors. Samahon adds that the waste received at the facility will generally come from within a 25-mile radius. Once it arrives, it will only be allowed to stay at the transfer station for a maximum of 24 hours. “That garbage has to turn around and go,” he says. “This isn’t a landfill. This isn’t somewhere where we can sit on garbage. It literally is a transfer station. The garbage comes in, and then it gets loaded into a transfer trailer, then goes out, and it heads to the landfill.”
Weaver says that before planning on the North Judson transfer station got underway, he arranged for several local officials to tour Metro Recycling’s existing facilities. “I then approached Ted Bombagetti, who was the director of emergency management in Starke County; Terry Stephenson, director of the county planning commission; and Dennis Estok, who was county surveyor at the time,” Weaver says. “They toured the facilities, and came back and reported to me that they were very clean. They were extremely impressed with the facilities. They were very neat and orderly, very clean. There was no junk laying around.” Weaver also notes that while steps are being taken to protect the local environment, the site of the proposed North Judson transfer station has been an industrial area for well over a century.
Samahon adds that a big goal of Metro Recycling is to help protect the environment by reducing the amount of garbage that ends up in landfills. “I’m not sure when it was bad to try to recycle,” he says. “And that’s the part that I don’t want to say frustrates me but I just kind of question. We’re trying to offer a benefit to the community by taking items because if it isn’t for facilities that are recycling, then we need to set aside more land for landfills, and I don’t think anybody’s going to be too happy about that.”
Samahon estimates that the new transfer station would create about five jobs initially. That could eventually increase to up to 15, depending on the success of the facility.
Metro Recycling plans to discuss the proposed facility with residents during Monday’s North Judson Town Council meeting at 6:30 p.m. Town officials have announced that Monday’s meeting has been moved to the North Judson–San Pierre Junior/Senior High School Auditorium. The presentation will be for informational purposes only, since the proposed site actually sits outside of the North Judson town limits and out of the town council’s jurisdiction. However, Weaver says council members have been involved in the project for at least the past year.
If the process continues to move along as scheduled, the new transfer station could open in the summer of 2017.
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