October 9, 2017 at 7:51 p.m.
All wind turbines are up
Jay County Commissioners
All wind turbines are up
The towers are up, and the turbines are turning.
Bluff Point Wind Energy Center is generating electricity, Jay County Commissioners were told Monday morning.
Now, it’s just a matter of cleaning things up.
“They’re in clean-up mode,” county engineer Dan Watson said of Blattner Energy. “The towers are all completed. They’re all energized.”
Watson said one tower has a bearing issue that will require having General Electric come in with a crane to temporarily remove a windmill propeller to make the necessary repairs.
But thanks to a dry August, Blattner, the Minnesota-based company building the wind farm for NextEra Energy, made quick work of the project.
Now attention is turning to taking out temporary turn radiuses at several intersections, repairing tiles and putting roads back in shape.
Watson said that under the terms of the county’s agreement with NextEra, Milestone will be putting down 16 miles of asphalt at an estimated cost of $2.3 million.
“Who knows what the weather’s going to do,” said Watson, “but I’d like to have much of that covered” by Thanksgiving.
Those slated for paving include:
•Countyroad 900 South from U.S. 27 to county road 400 East.
•Countyroad 100 West between county roads 900 South and 800 South.
•Countyroad 800 South from U.S. 27 to county road 600 East.
•Countyroad 300 East between county roads 900 South and 800 South.
•Countyroad 650 South from U.S. 27 to Boundary Pike.
•Treaty Line Road between county roads 800 South to 200 East.
“The roads held up a lot better than I thought they would,” said Watson, praising Blattner’s efforts to keep neighboring landowners informed.
“They bent overbackwards ,” said commissioner Mike Leonhard.
Highway superintendent Ken Wellman presented commissioners with tentative procedural guidelines for converting more of the county’s stone roads to bituminous paving.
Wellman’s guidelines incorporated work by the county’s road committee in 2016, which established a point system forconversion, and borrowed ideas from a number of other Indiana counties.
“These are just suggestions,” said Wellman.
The guidelines spell out minimums for rights-of-way, stone base depth,width of the driving surface, shoulder width, and the obligations of property owners along the routes be converted from stone.
“I’d like to go ahead and reactivate this (road) committee,” said commissioner president Chuck Huffman, adding that he would serve on the committee. Huffman suggested that changes in rural traffic patterns should be a part of the committee’s focus.
On Wellman’s recommendation, commissioners agreed to the purchase of a Western Star truck chassis for the highway department even though it was not the low bid. International had the low bid at $92,285, while Western Star’s came in at $100,306.
Operator visibility and safety were the deciding factors in Wellman’s recommendation. The Western Star has a sloped hood, making it much easier for the driver to see where a snowplow blade is going.
In other business, commissioners:
•Heard a presentation from Allied Mechanical Inc. of New Haven for maintenance of the heating, ventilation and air conditioning system at the Jay County Jail. The current contract with Havel expires at the end of this year, and commissioners have asked Sheriff Dwane Ford to get competing quotes. Havel is expected to make a presentation at the next commissioners meeting.
•Learned Jay County assessor Diana Stults will be advertising for bids for the next cyclical reassessment to be done from 2018 to 2022.
•Agreed to spend an additional $3,250 with Hatzell Brothers of Redkey for work on thedownspouting on a barn at the Jay County Retirement Center.
•Appointed Carl Walker and Phil Ford to the redevelopment commission for the county’s TIF district. Ford will be a non-voting member. State law calls for one of the members to be a school board member.
•Agreed to spend $500 to have a drone fly the course of the Salamonie River from Portland to the Jay-Blackford line in order to get a video look at the river’s condition and logjams.
•Appointed Kari Brotherton to the Penn Township Library Board.
•Learned that bank stabilization work on the Salamonie River in Portland is almost complete, with the last of the hydro-seeding yet to do.
Bluff Point Wind Energy Center is generating electricity, Jay County Commissioners were told Monday morning.
Now, it’s just a matter of cleaning things up.
“They’re in clean-up mode,” county engineer Dan Watson said of Blattner Energy. “The towers are all completed. They’re all energized.”
Watson said one tower has a bearing issue that will require having General Electric come in with a crane to temporarily remove a windmill propeller to make the necessary repairs.
But thanks to a dry August, Blattner, the Minnesota-based company building the wind farm for NextEra Energy, made quick work of the project.
Watson said that under the terms of the county’s agreement with NextEra, Milestone will be putting down 16 miles of asphalt at an estimated cost of $2.3 million.
“Who knows what the weather’s going to do,” said Watson, “but I’d like to have much of that covered” by Thanksgiving.
Those slated for paving include:
•County
•County
•County
•County
•County
•Treaty Line Road between county roads 800 South to 200 East.
“The roads held up a lot better than I thought they would,” said Watson, praising Blattner’s efforts to keep neighboring landowners informed.
“They bent over
Highway superintendent Ken Wellman presented commissioners with tentative procedural guidelines for converting more of the county’s stone roads to bituminous paving.
Wellman’s guidelines incorporated work by the county’s road committee in 2016, which established a point system for
“These are just suggestions,” said Wellman.
The guidelines spell out minimums for rights-of-way, stone base depth,
“I’d like to go ahead and reactivate this (road) committee,” said commissioner president Chuck Huffman, adding that he would serve on the committee. Huffman suggested that changes in rural traffic patterns should be a part of the committee’s focus.
On Wellman’s recommendation, commissioners agreed to the purchase of a Western Star truck chassis for the highway department even though it was not the low bid. International had the low bid at $92,285, while Western Star’s came in at $100,306.
Operator visibility and safety were the deciding factors in Wellman’s recommendation. The Western Star has a sloped hood, making it much easier for the driver to see where a snowplow blade is going.
In other business, commissioners:
•Heard a presentation from Allied Mechanical Inc. of New Haven for maintenance of the heating, ventilation and air conditioning system at the Jay County Jail. The current contract with Havel expires at the end of this year, and commissioners have asked Sheriff Dwane Ford to get competing quotes. Havel is expected to make a presentation at the next commissioners meeting.
•Learned Jay County assessor Diana Stults will be advertising for bids for the next cyclical reassessment to be done from 2018 to 2022.
•Agreed to spend an additional $3,250 with Hatzell Brothers of Redkey for work on the
•Appointed Carl Walker and Phil Ford to the redevelopment commission for the county’s TIF district. Ford will be a non-voting member. State law calls for one of the members to be a school board member.
•Agreed to spend $500 to have a drone fly the course of the Salamonie River from Portland to the Jay-Blackford line in order to get a video look at the river’s condition and logjams.
•Appointed Kari Brotherton to the Penn Township Library Board.
•Learned that bank stabilization work on the Salamonie River in Portland is almost complete, with the last of the hydro-seeding yet to do.
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