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SYRACUSE - Deciding what to do about Polywood Way took up a large portion of the agenda at Tuesday’s Syracuse Town Council meeting.
Ryan Zimmerman, vice president of human resources for Polywood, was present representing Polywood.
Councilman Nathan Scherer asked to be brought up to speed since the last meeting and Town Manager David Wilkinson said there weren’t any changes. He said he spoke to Polywood about their concerns and the town’s concerns.
He said, “The staff hasn’t changed our opinion.”
Zimmerman told the council, “You may remember we had a significant incident a couple of months ago between a vehicle and a pedestrian so we’re trying to explore options to mitigate any further incidents. Whether that’s signage, a crosswalk, speed bumps, etc.”
He said he’s had discussions with Wilkinson, the street department and Jim Layne, police chief. “At the end of the day, if the town doesn’t have the appetite to make the changes, we’ll assume the road and do it but our first choice is not to assume the liability, but we want to keep people safe and keep the traffic control,” he said.
Wilkinson said they took a closer look at it after the incident and said, “We don’t see a good way to mitigate it because there’s so much traffic on that road. It’s a publicly maintained road so we’re concerned about liability on the town’s side. They have operations on both sides of the road, so they have to cross over.”
Scherer said his biggest concern was long-term growth, especially at CR 1300. “If we close that off, what happens?”
Wilkinson said the council could engage Commonwealth to do a study, “But we have a lot of years of experience between the three of us, so we don’t know what else they’d find.”
He said Polywood asked for a speed bump a couple years ago, but the council denied it, concerned about snow removal.
Layne told the council, “It’s not just pedestrian traffic; there are multiple large trucks coming from all directions, semis parking on the street to unload, there’s a lot more to it than the pedestrian part and it’d be impossible to enforce.”
Zimmerman said, “We have 70 semi-trucks per day in the summer and that doesn’t count golf carts, forklifts and other vehicles.”
Councilman Bill Musser asked what if they have Polywood take over the road with a clause that if there’s a change because of future growth, they’d agree to allow access. Town attorney Jay Rigdon said they really couldn’t do that, the town either vacates the road or they don’t.
Both Scherer and Council President Cindy Kaiser said they wanted to be a good partner with Polywood because they’re such a great employer for the town, but Scherer continued to repeat his concerns for future growth being deterred by closing off that road from Maple Street west to CR 1300.
Kaiser said she’d like Commonwealth to look at it, “Not that I don’t trust you guys,” she said.
Jeremy Hardy, from Commonwealth, was present and he said they could take a holistic view of it, taking into consideration what options there’d be for future development if they close Polywood Way and have them take over the street. There was no actual vote on the issue.
Huntington Street Water Projects
Hardy said they received bids last month on the water project. Division A received six bids, ranging from $1.3 million to $2.4 million, and Commonwealth’s estimate was $2 million. Division A is the water utility improvements to the water lines. KLS Underground of Constantine, Mich., had the low bid of $1,328,221.20.
Division B, which includes new water mains and lead service replacements, had four bids, ranging from $1.1 million to $1.6 million. KLS Underground was the lowest bidder at $1,110,370.62, which is $650,000 below the engineer’s estimate.
He said with Office of Community Rural Affairs and State Revolving Funds, they can’t officially accept the bids until they release the funds. The council accepted the bids tentatively based on the release of funds.
Hardy also informed the council that Brooks Construction, Fort Wayne, was awarded the 2026 paving project at $522,833.05. The council accepted and approved the bid.
Town Manager’s Report
Wilkinson reported that the town did not receive the READI 2.0 funds for the boardwalk project. However, he did receive $300,000 from the Redevelopment Commission at their meeting held earlier “so the project is fully funded.”
As the council requested, he revisited having a redundant server along with cameras. Imperial said the dedicated server where all the data from security cameras could be downloaded and stored would be an additional $42,000. He said the total cost for all the cameras and redundant storage would be $311,403.25.
Each camera has storage for a week and can be downloaded. Scherer wanted to know how much storage and for how long they’d get for the $42,000 and if there is another option but he was not confident with one week’s storage. Wilkinson said he would revisit it again.
He also reported that concerning the four access roads on the east side of Ind. 13 they want to eliminate, Indiana Department of Transportation gave their blessing. They would remove the asphalt as part of their project on Ind. 13, but the dirt would remain so people may still try to use it as an access. Wilkinson said it would be up to the town to come up with a creative way to keep people from driving through them. The council needs to make a decision at their September meeting. Scherer asked Wilkinson to get a list of do’s and don’ts from INDOT.
In other business, the council:
• Introduced an ordinance to vacate a right-of-way. There was no vote but if they vacate the right-of-way the land would be divided among the landowners. Musser is one of the landowners and it’s his neighbor that is requesting the vacation, but Musser said nothing could be built on the property.
• Heard the last farmer’s market will be Labor Day weekend.
• Heard the first Pee Wee football will be this Saturday at Schrock Athletic complex.
• Heard the new police officer is going down to the Law Enforcement Academy Aug. 31 to mid-December.
• Heard the street department is working on difficult storm sewer repair on Chicago Street. They removed one blockage but there are more to be removed.
