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Last updated on Thursday, May 30, 2013
(BEDFORD) - Lawrence County Council members voted unanimously to approve a $1.8 million bond issuance request from the Mitchell Community Public Library Board of Trustees for the purpose of making significant renovations to the library.
In the past, the library board would have petitioned Mitchell for authority to issue the bond. Greg Pittman, attorney for the library board, explained that because more than half of the parcels within the library district lie outside the city, the county is the appropriate body to consider the bond issue.
The library's current bond will be retired in 2014.
Alexis Caudell, director of the Mitchell library, noted the board had undertaken surveys and focus groups and also conferred with Sheriff Sam Craig on potential security issues.
She said a new configuration was necessary to meet contemporary needs.
Payments on the new bond are the same as the old. The first full installment on the new bond is due June 2015.
In other business:
* Lawrence County Sheriff Sam Craig suggested the council consider creating a new line item in the budget in which to funnel Department of Correction payments to the county for the purpose of future maintenance to the jail.
The DOC pays the county $35 a day per inmate housed in the Bedford facility.
He noted the jail needs additional segregation cells to accommodate problematic prisoners. The DOC funds are currently flowing into the county's general fund.
Councilmen Jim Edwards and Craig Turpen volunteered to research the possibility of creating a new line item.
* Councilman Keith Dillman updated the council on a problem regarding the county's geographic information system. He said nearly 4,000 parcels remain unidentified.
Dillman noted 39 Degrees North, the county's system provider, was not responsible for the omissions. He said the commissioners were checking with the previous provider to ascertain the source of the problem.
* The council approved requests to fill vacancies in several departments, including: part-time worker in voter registration office; drug court director via the probation department; full-time crew member in the highway department; and a part-time dispatcher, full-time dispatcher and matron at the jail.
* Clerk Myron Rainey's request for an appropriation of $2,419 for materials needed for refurbishing the voter registration's new office was approved.
Rainey explained a move from the current voter registration location just inside the north entrance of the courthouse to a room in the basement was necessitated by upcoming changes to the facility's security policies.
Rainey requested the funds to paint the basement office and replace carpet.
* The council approved tax abatement statements of compliance for PRD Inc., D&M Tool, American Fibertech and Hoosier Energy and Wabash Valley Power.
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