Is Now A Good Time To Go Into Debt?

If I was a member of the Warsaw School Board I think I would be hard-pressed to launch into a major building program right now. It just seems like a bad time to go $41 million in debt. I understand that there is a need for facilities.No doubt about that.Schools are in need of repair or replacement. But one must wonder if this wouldn't be a good time to make do with what we have for a while. The school board says this is a good time to forge ahead because interest rates are low. That's true, but even if you float a $41 million bond at 4 percent, that's still more than a million-and-a-half dollars a year in interest. And this at a time when Gov.Frank O'Bannon is talking about the state budget being in crisis and floating the idea that there might have to be cuts in education funding.

Where Are All The Conservatives?

Although I generally tend to be conservative, I must admit some of the things I see going on in W's administration are a bit unsettling to me. First, there's the budget. You know, it's as if a conservative can get onlyÊhalf of the equation right. Remember Ronald Reagan? What is he remembered for? Deficits.Why? Because of his tax cuts? No, because of his spending. The Reagan tax cuts worked masterfully at stimulating the economy and generating more revenue for the treasury.In fact, revenue streaming to the Treasury grew each year and topped $1 trillion for the first time in the nation's history during the Reagan administration. Wonderful, you say.Yes, that part of it - the revenue side - was OK, but the other half of the equation was out of whack. That's the spending side. Government spent every dime and then some.

On The Court

Poll Shows Demo Strategy Not Working

I must admit to being a bit of a CNN junkie. We have it on all the time in the newsroom here at the Times-Union and I check in from time to time at home. So I am pretty in tune to CNN's programming.Many times I have seen political analyst/correspondent Bill Schneider on American Morning doing what he does best - analyzing the latest Gallup poll. Lately, at least for the past few months, he has been analyzing how poorly W is perceived by the public. He would explain that W's job approval ratings were in the low 30s - according to the latest poll numbers - and then tell us why. That, certainly, is legitimate news. Usually, you see this a couple times a month, which is when the polls come out. These programs on CNN are out-of-sight, out-of-mind for me.I notice them when they're broadcast, but I don't anticipate them or remember when they're supposed to be on.

Kesler's Return Helps Settle Tigers

The date was Oct.8, 1999, when Ross Kesler knew he had injured himself. The Warsaw senior athlete knew because he had injured his back two years earlier, and now he had injured it again after taking a hit in a football game against NorthWood. And, oh yeah, the pain told him. "I knew I had hurt myself pretty bad," Kesler said. Kesler fractured his back his sophomore year and refractured it again as a senior, in a different spot. The back injury kept Kesler out of sports for nine weeks, until he returned for the Dec.10 basketball game against Wawasee. After returning, the toughest part for Kesler, as it is for most athletes after an injury, was adjusting and trusting.The doctors told him his back was healed, but he needed to clear a mental hurdle, getting over the fear that banging around on the court would reinjure him.

Patrick's First Superstar Recalls 1963

High school boys basketball in Indiana has seen the winds of change, but at least one thing has stood the test of time: Bill Patrick. How things have changed since Patrick, the gray-haired 61-year-old who commands the Tippecanoe Valley Vikings, took his first varsity coaching position some 30 years ago. Patrick, a 1956 graduate of Sidney High School, began his coaching career in a time when heroes came to be by putting a leather ball in an iron hoop, a time when most boys knew two things: basketball and farming. Patrick picked up his first varsity win Nov.1, 1963, at Sidney High School, a school with 69 students in grades 9-12, when his players were named Jerry Walther, Henry Whitaker, and the Leiter boys, Tom and John.Today he will guide Tippecanoe Valley, a school of 700, against Northfield with players named Craig Kuhn, Noah Silveus, Dax Snyder and the Eaton Brothers, Brandon and Trey, as he searches for win No.500.

Sometimes Intervention Is Necessary

Since last spring, Diana Welker has been concerned about her friend, Lucille Conrady. Apparently, her concern was not misguided. Conrady is in her 80s.She lives on an EMS lane off of Backwater Road, North Webster. There are conflicting reports on whether her home has running water.Some say there is a hose hooked up.Others say the hose is frozen. This week, Conrady is a patient in Kosciusko Community Hospital, where she is listed in "stable" condition. Emergency medical service personnel removed her from her home the day after Christmas.She was underweight and suffering from dehydration. Conrady received intravenous fluids and a hospital spokesman says discharge planners will discuss options for Conrady when she is well enough to leave the hospital.Case managers will look at the best options for her placement, whether that's a nursing home, assisted living or other arrangement.

Hornets' Ezell Goes For 42, Hits Game-Winner

There was no doubt who would take the last shot for Gary Wallace. With the scored tied at 74 with five seconds remaining, the Hornets' Herman Ezell took an inbounds pass, dribbled until the free-throw line and nailed a 15-footer as time ran out to give Gary Wallace a 76-74 win Friday at the Tiger Den. Those two points gave Ezell a total of 42 points, the highest individual point total against Warsaw in a decade. "He made a heck of a shot to win," Warsaw coach Al Rhodes said."We wanted to stay in front and try to make him shoot it over the top.It would have been nice to keep it out of his hands, but with five seconds left, we were very concerned with a lob play underneath with the big guy (Lonnie Jones)." Ezell, a junior, hit on 18 of 25 field goal attempts and 4 of 6 from the line for his 42 points.He scored 12 points in the first, seven in the second, eight in the third and 11 in the fourth.

Winona Hears Complaint About Snow Removal

WINONA LAKE - Winona Lake Park Director Jim LeMasters told the Winona Lake Town Council today that something needs to be done about the lack of snow removal in town. Council president Jerry Clevenger agreed.He said Pierceton Road is a sheet of ice.Clerk-treasurer Retha Hicks said she is pleased with the shoveling, but salt for the road wasn't delivered until Tuesday. "I think that's the problem," Hicks said. "We don't have a plan," LeMasters said about plowing the roads."We gotta have a plan and I don't think we have one." LeMasters also said there are plenty of people who volunteer to plow so the lack of help is not the problem. Town marshal Malcolm Gilbert said county dispatchers received numerous complaints over the last few days. Clevenger said the issue will be addressed and something will be done about the problem.

All It Takes Is A Little Editing

I got a letter this week from a reader.It was a truly great letter. So good, in fact, I was moved to write a column about it.And even though the letter writer was pretty hard on me and this newspaper, I had to agree with him. The letter appeared in our "Letters" column on Friday.Perhaps some of you remember it.It was about Associated Press and their coverage of Bob Dole's speech at the Republican National Convention.

Project Exile: Enforcing Laws Really Works

Have you ever heard of Project Exile? Until a week or so ago, I hadn't either.I saw a small, one-page article in Time Magazine about it. Lots of stuff slips by me.I don't see every story about every issue.But I do try to keep up. That's why I was really surprised to find out about this Project Exile thing in a small article in the back of Time Magazine. Seems to me it should be on the front pages of a bunch of big newspapers.Seems to me Associated Press should have it on their digest. But no.Most people probably have never even heard about it.And it's been going on for quite a while. Project Exile was an idea hatched by federal prosecutors in Richmond, Va.You see, they simply started prosecuting criminals who violated gun laws.

Baseball Becomes Foul With Strike

I am not a huge baseball fan. I never really have been.I never watch a whole baseball game during the regular season. I might watch part of a game during the league championship series and a whole game or two of the World Series - depending on the teams involved. Baseball isn't a really big part of my life.But to a lot of fans, it is. I know guys like that.They can recite team rosters back into the 1960s.They have encyclopedic knowledge of individual player statistics - batting averages, number of runs and hits, earned run averages and the like. Fans like that watch lots of games.They travel to attend games.They love the game.The game is a big part of their lives. So I know that if a guy like me - who has at most a passing interest in Major League Baseball - is ticked off by the notion of another baseball strike, the real fans must be livid.

School Debate Needs To Be Clear, Open

I've been reading about the Warsaw Community Schools building/redistricting stuff in the newspaper. I think it's too bad that a number of WCS patrons seem to have lost faith in the school board's ability to make decisions regarding the education of their kids. I also wonder how big a number of patrons have actually lost faith.I wonder if it is just patrons around Silver Lake, Claypool and Atwood, where the school board is proposing to close schools, or if people outside those areas have raised eyebrows. It's always difficult and unpopular to close schools, and the school board is charged with making difficult decisions. I understand that. But I think the school board might have been able to smooth things over with the public a little better than they did. In July 2002 finance manager Rande Thorpe said the school corporation was facing a deficit and that "reductions in staff and programs are not just possible but likely" unless new revenue is received.

There Is Just Way Too Much Television

I hate to be accused of waxing nostalgic but I can't help but notice how weird television has become these days. I remember how television was in the '60s when I was a kid.You had three choices - ABC, NBC or CBS. You could watch the local PBS channel, but nobody did. And the next day when you went to school, fully a third of the kids you talked to watched the same thing you did. Shows like "Gilligan's Island," "Hogan's Heroes," "The Beverly Hillbillies," "Green Acres." People in their 30s and 40s have those theme songs deeply imbedded in their brains. Nickelodeon, the kid channel, runs a feature called "Nick at Night."They show reruns of those old shows. My guess is that no kids watch "Nick at Night."People my age do. But as goofy and corny as those old shows were, we all saw them for what they were - goofy and corny. You always knew Gilligan was going to do something stupid.You always knew Colonel Hogan was going to make the Germans look stupid.

Tower Bank Coming To Warsaw In January

Tower Bank, headquartered in Fort Wayne, will break ground for a new bank at the corner of Main and Buffalo streets northeast of the courthouse square in January. "We chose this location because it is at the heart of the business district in Warsaw and the bank brings a unique opportunity to build excitement in downtown Warsaw," said Tower Bank Warsaw Community Bank President John Warren. Warren received the bank's design sketches Nov.6 from architect Doug Routh of SchenkelShultz Architecture, Fort Wayne.Warren said the bank is targeted to open for business in August 2007. The opening of Warsaw's branch will make the eighth Tower Bank in Northeast Indiana. There are six Tower Banks in Allen County and one in Angola. Trois Hart, vice president of marketing for Tower Bank, said the company has been looking to build other banks in communities where they will thrive.

Eaton Makes History In Viking Win

AKRON - A night he was honored for breaking an individual record, Tippecanoe Valley senior Trey Eaton once again made sure his team was the real winner. Scoring 12 of his game-high 32 points in the fourth quarter Saturday night, the talented 6-foot-4 hoopster led Valley's varsity boys basketball team to a 65-55 home win over Three Rivers Conference foe Northfield. With his first points of the second half, a nothing-but-net 10-foot jumper, Eaton became Valley's all-time leading scorer, breaking 1992 graduate Scott Johnson's mark of 1,352. More important to Eaton than being the school's all-time scoring leader was that the Class 3A No.4 Vikings improved to 11-0 overall and 2-0 in the TRC.

Reagan's Legacy Will Be Just Fine

I listened with interest as a pundit from the left attempted to excoriate the legacy of former President Ronald Reagan on CNN. Hasn't he heard the old advice, "Don't speak ill of the dead?" Oh well, just another compassionate liberal, I always say. It reminded me of the time when Reagan was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease.Some of my liberal colleagues were making jokes about Reagan's "I can't recall" answers during the Iran/Contra hearings. Yeah, Alzheimer's.That's a real knee-slapper. Of course liberals can't stand Ronald Reagan.With good reason.He turned piles of Democrats into Republicans. Reagan made it so the only way a liberal can get elected is if he talks like a conservative. Take Bill Clinton for example.He will be remembered largely for - not counting the cigar and blue dress - being a champion of tax cuts, balanced budgets and welfare reform.Not exactly what I would call liberal ideals. But I digress.

Smoke 'Em If You Can Afford 'Em

I bought a couple packs of Camel filters a while back. I'm not a smoker, but when you bought two packs of smokes you got a free T-shirt. I bought the smokes to get the free T-shirt.The cigarettes cost $4.30.I gave them to a guy who works in the circulation department.I figured $4.30 wasn't too much to pay for a T-shirt. I wanted the shirt to wear as a silent protest of the way the tobacco industry has been demonized by our government. Don't get me wrong.I don't think the tobacco industry is perfect.I'm sure they had negative information about their product that they didn't readily share with the public.

Adams Decides Not To Run For State Senate In 2004

State Sen.Kent Adams (R-Warsaw) announced today he will not seek re-election to the Indiana Senate District 9 seat in the May 4 primary election. "When I first went to Indianapolis, I didn't plan on making it a career," he said this morning.Adams and his wife, Nancy, are parents of five grown children.The couple have 15 grandchildren. Adams will be 68 when he completes his third term at the end of 2004. "I don't want to be carried out of there," the former teacher and Indiana State Trooper said. Adams is serving on the Eric Miller gubernatorial campaign along with ex.-Gov.Otis Bowen.Adams has no plans to accept an appointment should Miller gain the state's top office. "I'm not doing it (working on the campaign) because I want anything.Maybe I'll be a greeter at Wal-Mart," he said, tongue-in-cheek. "I have a desire to spend more time with our family and their activities.Being closer to home will allow me to do this," he said.

Ya Win Some, Ya Loose Some

Winners and losers. Too bad life has to be that way, but there are winners and losers. Sometimes you are disappointed, other times you aren't. That's just the way it goes. Sometimes the disappointment is out of your control.Other times it's unfair. But what is always under your control is how you react to disappointment. How you choose to handle it is up to you. Over the years in this business I have witnessed firsthand how people deal with disappointment. And sometimes it isn't pretty. You've heard the old phrase, "Don't shoot the messenger."Well, the small daily newspaper is the ultimate messenger. And believe me, people are shooting us all the time. Sometimes we deserve it.Many times we deserve it.Like when we butcher someone's name or bungle the facts. But lots of times people fire shots at us just for reporting something disappointing.