The Kosciusko County Redevelopment Commission has several matters to consider for its March meeting.
During Tuesday’s meeting, Commission President Joni Truex said there are three opportunities the commission has been apprised of, including the town of Claypool working to create a tax increment financing district with Louis Dreyfus. Truex said the town has requested assistance from the commission and she's already met with Claypool representatives a couple times for discussion.
Truex also mentioned a company wanting to upgrade a building on West U.S. 30 to expand its operations, and someone who is interested in creating a shell building on North Ind. 15. These entities have yet to be named publicly.
Truex said she will email all the information she has on the requests to the commission members and told the commission to prepare for discussing the matters at length during their March meeting.
The commission was also asked by Commission Vice President Doug Hanes to consider the possibility of expanding the commission from five members to seven.
"While it hasn't happened very often, there's been a couple times where we've come close to not having a quorum," Hanes said.
Hanes also pointed out the redevelopment commission could spread out work more evenly among the members, especially with the upcoming projects mentioned by Truex.
Truex said she could see having more members on the commission if the area was a community similar to Indianapolis or South Bend. She also noted the importance of possibly having certain criteria for someone to be seated on the commission.
In other business, the commission approved a $5,900 invoice from Abonmarche, a civil engineering firm working to create a strategic plan for the CR 1300N corridor project.
Plan Commission Director Matt Sandy said the steering committee for the project has met once since the redevelopment commission's November 2023 meeting. He noted discussions were positive and representatives from the towns of Syracuse and Milford were in attendance.
"One of the big things that came out of it was the (possible) expansion of the district to look at," said Sandy. "What came up was the CR 17 extension that's been talked about back and forth for years, and possibly extending the district to look over all the way to that extension area."
County Auditor Rhonda Helser also gave Hanes, Truex, Commission Secretary Dan Thystrup and Commission member Jan Orban their oaths of office. Commission member Mike Metzger was absent. Truex, Hanes and Thystrup will also continue serving in their respective officer positions for 2024.
The commission approved continuing to meet every other month, specifically at 1:30 p.m. on the second Thursday.