Monday, January 28, 2008

The Fishie - Fishersian

There is a guy by the name of Fishie - or is it Fishersian, he hides behind the Star and will not tell us his name. Yet he calls people all kinds of name if they don't agree with him. He calls all Mayors Der Furher, so I have to wonder about him.

Friday, January 25, 2008

Swiftboating – Fishers Style

Swiftboating is a term invented by Karl Rove to tell half-truths, to lie to just to win an election. If you want to read about draft-dodger Karl and many of the other underhanded things he has done go to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_Rove.

In Fishers you don’t have elections, since it is a one party rule town, but we do have Swiftboating on the Geist Annexation. This became crystal clear on the night of the enactment of the Ordinances to Annex the three areas of Geist.

Councilmen Art Levine made the only real truthful statement that evening. He said “This is in the best interest, long-term, for the residents of Fishers.” Notice he said for Fishers and not for Geist. He is 100% correct it is a lose lose for Geist and a gain for Fishers. The net flow of tax money into Fishers is approximately $4.5 million more than what they would have to spend on the Geist area. So if you live in Fishers these guys are working for you, if you live in Geist they are working against you. Actually even if your live in Fishers they are working against you in the long run with a total lack of planning.

Now lets look at some of the other statements of the evening.

Fishers has kept taxes flat and low, yes that is correct, but they didn’t tell you about all the hidden taxes, such as the new Storm Water Tax. Or all the impact fees they charge for every new home build, it’s a tax on new home-owners, now it may be smart to do it this way for the current residence but it is a Ponzi Scheme, when new development runs out, they will have to shift all these impact fees into taxes. The only way Fishers can keep taxes down is by adding more and more land. More and more development. More and more annexations.

An expert from Wabash Scientific starting with telling us what a bunch of good guys and on the great work of Fishers, but keep saying I am not an accountant and this is my estimate. I also am not an accountant and I can say my estimate is the exact opposite of his. This same expert testified before the Senate Summer Study and not one of his items of support of statements made it to the final Bill. Further he never got to talk at the Senate Public Hearing on the Annexation Bill, but told the Chairwomen that most people in Geist are in favor of Annexation and that only a few people are waving their hands and yelling against annexation from the GUO Well so much for the creditability of this hire gun from Fishers. I wonder what he will say when 90% of the Geist people sign the remonstration documents. He needs to remove the word “Scientific” from his company’s name, as it is misleading and false.

Then we came to hired gun number two, who continued to talk about the New Towns of Geist. And how bad the documents and the fiscal plans were and no detail contracts for services. Well, I wonder if he read the law on forming a new town. After listening to him I have to wonder, since you can’t sign a contract until you are a town, how can you have a contract in your plan. It’s a chicken and egg, but he scrambled it all for one reason to generate fear. But I think the real fear is in the town council. They live in total fear of the new Towns and they know the plan is good and that is what is causing all these nasty comments. They known on of the best town budget planners in the State of Indiana put it together. They know the fire and police protection are sound but lets scare people with words from an “expert” that they are not. For example, they left out that the Castleton Fire Department, that would move to Geist has $2,000,000.00 plus in equipment and that the Lawrence Township Fire Department has agreed to house the new Fire Department until a house is built and that the use of the 86th street firehouse would continue. They also would agreed to back up and mutual aid. That the run times in the future will be less than the current Fishers run times. They left out that after seeing this plan they realized they had to add a fir station in the same location that had been proposed by the new towns. That the new town would actually have the use of three stations under this plan instead of the two from Fishers.

They are also back peddling on the use of parks. They are starting to realize the people of Geist live in a park. They are also using this in two different ways. Lets look first they say the plan for the new Towns is flawed because they don’t have a park or even room for a park, then in the next sentence they say under the Annexation we will build a park in the Geist area – this is what Swiftboating is about.

Fishers has no real debt, they have a high credit rating, yes Fishers has a high credit rating, YES Fishers has debt, they have bonds that will be coming due, they have stated in the annexation fiscal plans new debt of 10 million dollars, they have in the downtown development and have stated it is private with no town money, but we will be doing a 15 million TIF. That is where they will in the future forgive 15 million dollars in taxes to help out the private developer to throw all the people and businesses in that area out of their homes, etc. Have you recently noticed they have stopped talking about the expansion of the Town Hall? I am willing to make you a multi-million dollar bet once this Annexation is over it will be back. I wonder if they had to pull it for now because the yellow shirt people would have pointed out the excess waste of the Town Council.

Of course my favorite has to be SPORTS, and the use of Fishers Parks. In the past a few Fishers Council members have been saying all those Fishers people use all of our services for free. These have been shot down one after another. Now they have a new tactic, all people who live outside a town or city are subsidized to the tune of 75% by the nearby town. So if that is true, Fishers it time you paid Marion –Indy for the all the money they have investing in the city for all your citizens who work in the city. Now on to parks, according to them it costs between $500-1000 for every child who plays for each and every sport in the Fishers parks and Geist children take part. What they left out is that Fishers children play in SPORTS in the HSE School facilities which are also paid for by every home-owner in Geist and most of the volunteers in the SPORTS program live in Geist. Now at $500 that means a family of two children who play in one fall and one spring sport costs the town between $2000 and $4000 dollars which is more than taxes on the average home in Fishers. So give a break. What funny numbers are they using, oh they are putting all the costs of the entire costs of the parks from day one and then dividing it by the number children playing sports and using that number for each and every year. By using this accounting method, they are paying for the entire park system over and over every year. Swiftboating at its best.

Yes, Karl Rove would be at home on the Fishers Town Council

Monday, January 21, 2008

Stu Easley Does it again - Misleading Statements

In s statement before the Indiana Senate Local Government Committee Mr. Stuart Easley, a member of the Fishers Town Council, make the remark that Fishers Police Department provides police protection to the Geist area they are trying to annex. Well, Stu, glad to see you are keeping up your misleading statements of half-truths. A detail review of three months of police run data from the Indy Star indicates that Fishers PD did make runs to the Geist area but only 10% of the runs and actually many of these were not runs but rather traffic stops on streets that are shared with Geist or border on the Geist community. In addition several of those runs were to assist the County Sheriff in an arrest and several others were investigations and not true runs.

So Stu, I want to know, as a research scientist at Lilly, do you collect data on your projects the same way?

Also Stu, public service is a public trust. If you keep making up stories and data maybe you should leave public office, as how can anyone trust what you say.

Friday, January 18, 2008

Stu Easley on Fairness

Poor Stu Easley was quoted in today’s Fishers Star claiming that it’s unfair that the Bill before the Senate would stop all forced annexation from 1 Jan 2008 on and the Town of Fishers has started it annexation so it should be allowed to continue.

OK Stu, lets talk about being fair. You claim it is unfair for Senate Bill 0144 to be retroactive to 1 Jan 2008, well lets see that’s 18 days back. You have been given notice not to annex. Lets go one step further, you have not yet passed your ordinance to annex so its not yet even retroactive, in fact you could stop and wait and see if this becomes law.

Now lets have a top 10 list about being fair:

1. It’s unfair to annex people against their will.

2. It’s unfair to prevent people from forming their own town, their own government.

3. It’s unfair to tax without representation.

4. It’s unfair to blackmail developers with sewer wavers to get a building permit.

5. It’s unfair to threaten people with shutting off sewers unless they come into Fishers

6.It’s extremely unfair to threaten children that they will not be allowed to play in the SPORTS program or continue to attend their school.

7. It’s unfair that citizens have to raise money to fight you in court to stop a hostile forced annexation.

8. It’s unfair to treat people as a golden money pot and pull $4.5 million out of their area for your other wasteful projects.

9. It’s unfair to make misleading statements about all those “Millionaires who live at Geist” many of whom are not even close to being millionaires.

10. It’s unfair to lie about all those Geist people getting Fishers services for free.

Thursday, January 17, 2008

Victory comes in small steps Indiana Senate Bill 0144

This is the day the common folks won a small victory over the government of Fishers and others like them. The Bill to reform Annexations was approved by the Senate Local Government Committee. A small victory, but a victory. Now the Bill goes to the full Senate. Now we need to get all the citizens of the entire state to marshal forces to write all our Senators to stop government to force its will against people.

Now to Fishers, Indiana. To the Town Council STOP, LOOK and LISTEN. Slow down your annexation, you know you should not vote to annex at your Council Meeting, since this Bill would make any annexation null and void between 1 Jan and 1Jul of this year. I can see you going ahead spending thousands of dollar and then puff.

You know you never expected the Citizens to get this far, well we did and now watch us get this Bill past. Maybe sometimes the government is for the people. But in the case of Fishers it will only be when the people take control of the government. So Citizens of Fishers it time to work to take control of your reckless government.

Saturday, January 12, 2008

Scott does it again

Scott got himself elected to be the Fishers, IN town council president. What is interesting was last year when the council memebers wanted to have the position rotate. Also what is interesting is that Scott indicated he was going to step down.

Sounds like Scott wants to become King for Life.

He sure runs a very tight ship, I wonder if any of the other Council members can do anything without his approval.

Friday, January 11, 2008

Scott no New Years Rsolutions in 2008

Jan 11, 2008


It’s a new year and the ads for quitting smoking and diets and attacking from all sides. Of course gym equipment ads abound. It New Year’s resolution time. But it’s also time to look back and see if some of last year’s resolutions have been met.

So just for the fun of it here are the 2007 resolutions of Town of Fishers Council President Scott Faultless:

“Complete the (Geist) annexation this year. …Work on getting the airport moved and improving traffic. Probably traffic is number one. Annexation is number two and the airport is number three.”

Well Scott, three strikes and your out. Oh I forgot you can’t be out, it’s Fishers where you get appointed to elective office and stay forever.

Scott, I noticed you didn’t have any resolutions this year.

Saturday, January 5, 2008

Fishers, Indiana Census – Some funny items

Indy Star article January 4, 2008

According to the article Fishers is now up to 66,000 people and I now know one of the primary reason behind the annexation of Geist – no its not the $3 million dollars a year in profit from property taxes, and the 1.5 million dollars in increased revenue from the state, no its not because “the Geisters are using all those free things from Fishers,” no its not because Geist is a nice place, no its not because Fishers could then add more strip malls along Olio road.

The real reason is with the 5,000 people from Geist Fishers would be larger than Carmel.
The new population numbers would be:
Fishers 71,000
Carmel 68,653

And
Another funny line from the article:
(Scott) “Faultless said Fishers still maintains its small-town flavor.”

But
I think what Mr. Morton Marcus, director emeritus of the Indiana Business Research Council said makes more sense:
“The bigger a town gets, the less inclined people may be to move in – and town services will be tested in the future.”

The citizens of Geist want to maintain its small town flavor and not become part of a town bigger than Carmel.

Tuesday, January 1, 2008

Conflicts of Interest – Fishers Gov’t Style

The way you deal with Conflicts of Interest in Fishers Government is to ignore them and claim that isn’t so. Last night at the Fishers Planning Commission meeting we had a couple of Conflicts and of course they will claim “oh no” but folks it is OH YES.

The citizens of Geist want to form their own town and not become part of Fishers, Fishers of course wants to annex their homes for tax dollars. So the citizens filed to become a town and under state law the County Commissioners have to have the Zoning authority for that area do a review. The problem here is that the zoning for the Geist area is under contract by the County to the Fishers Planning Commission. This raises the first question can the Fishers Planning Commission; most of whom are appointed by Fishers provide a fair assessment? I will leave that unanswered for now.

Let zoom forward to the meeting on October 30, 2007 to review the plans for the Towns of Geist. Now lets zoom past the presentation for the towns and go to the remonstration by the Town of Fishers. This was lead by the Town Attorney, whoa, the Town Attorney, isn’t he also in a way the Attorney for the Planning Commission, I think so. But of course no undo influence when your attorney gets in front of you and says this is a very bad idea. To get around this they hired another attorney and from Ft Wayne no less, keep him far away so he can’t help out much. Of course, the Fishers Town Attorney can’t have any influence on the Planning Commission, when did they ever listen to him anyway. Maybe the State Bar Association should be asked this question, oh forget that idea, the Town Attorney is the head of the Bar Association.

Now lets zoom to the next bombshell. The statement by the staff member of the Planning Commission. This is someone who works and gets paid directly by the Town of Fishers. This is the person who said along with a few of the Commission members who volunteered he will be preparing the Commission report for approval at their next meeting. Yes, folks you read that correctly, a paid Town employee is going to write the opinion of the Commission, in fact you could see some surprise in the eyes of the Commission members. But, of course no objections. When is the commission going to meet to discuss this? When is the Commission going to have a question and answer period? When is the Commission going to have an OPEN public hearing? When is the Commission going to admit there is a direct conflict of interest and this should be turned over to someone else to review? Four questions and four easy answers- Never, Never, Never and Never.

A note to the County Commissioners - Richard C. Cushing once said “When I see a bird that walks like a duck and swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, Icall that bird a duck.”

People of Fishers – One Party Rule?

In Friday, November 2, 2007, Fishers Star was an article on how Fishers is run by one party – it does not matter which party, what matters is that it is run by one party. That’s why they do as they please.

Oh my, one of the members of the Town Council actually has to run for office. The other members must be wondering behind his back how unlucky he is. Now the odds are he will be re-elected because it appears the citizens of Fishers don’t care about government. They let the Fishers Council do as they please. You can tell by the programs they push, all big dollar projects with the hope for vast growth and more and more traffic jams, but who cares. Our kids and grandkids will care. The schools are already over-crowded; the streets are jam-packed and just wait until they get the projects on the drawing board approved. More and more traffic. Getting home will take even more time, the I-69 Expressway will become the I-69 Disdressway. Of course that will be cured when they expand it to 12 lanes and maybe even a double decker roadway. But when you get to 116th Street you will then be on the Fishers slow moving parking lot. I know they will enact a law changing rush hour to slow hour. After all no one will oppose them.

So Fishers voters here is your chance, I know it will be hard for some of you to cross party lines and vote for the lone opponent but its something you should do. For lots of reasons, the most important is to a check and balance on the government, someone who will speak up, someone who will keep the Council honest by just being there. Yes, for someone who said the will of the people is important. Notice the incumbent only wanted to talk about more growth.

So make history as the article stated by voting in the first person of the opposite party. But them again maybe some of you like living in Cuba – Oh I mean Fishers.

The government of Fishers strikes again with more government growth and more fees,etc.

Here is the latest in stupid government. In Fishers Star on November 16, 2007 is an article on a new user fee for Storm Water and the creation of a new Board. A new board, oh yes, and do you want to bet a bunch of staff people to back them up. More government. What would be wrong if this board were not created and instead added as a function to the sewer board? No way, can’t grow government that way. Next come the bills they are going to send out four times a year. Hey guys I have a plan – add it to the sewer bills that are mailed out anyway. Let see approximately 20.611 households at $4.55 a month that’s only $1,125,360 a year now lets add the 1500 business in town and you get a total income of 1.2 million dollars. Want to bet the sewer company could do it for less and no more people on the government payroll.

Now what is this board going to do.
Inspection for illicit discharge- why not issue fines for this and earn income from the people who are bad and not from all the good homeowners.
Reduce storm water pollution from government – well if we had smaller government we would have less pollution. If we had properly designed parks and buildings we would have less pollution, but why brother, we can’t tax more if we do.
And finally education and my favorite under this one is “adopt a road” aren’t we already doing this under the highways department. Now we claim we need to do under water, or is this just a shell game. Now we are going to teach in schools, that when it rains, water flows down the streets and into a ditch that is attached to a storm sewer that runs into a creek and then into either a lake or river. Class done – spend another million next year.
I am surprised they didn’t include stop the rain.

And best yet this announcement was made after the election. Well that didn’t matter the people of Fishers don’t care to stand up stop the guys running the town anyway. Its their own private town and now you have them for another long four years of tax increase any way they can do it.

Town’s Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) to exempt Town owned properties

OK. You Fishers folks all of you must follow the Unified Development Ordinance (UDO) Ordinance No.090605A except the Town. Isn’t that nice, the Town can’t follow its on rules. It’s too much of a burden. They are also exempting them selves from the park lighting requirements. The ink on this ordinance is not even dry, adopted October 16, 2006 with an effective date of November 15, 2006 and already the Town can’t follow its own rules. Now it’s not like a new batch of Council people got elected and needed to change things, its same old Country Club Town Council crowd. What they want to do is light up the parks and have them glow in the night. Three things for all of you to consider, one is the waste of electric power to light up the night, second is the waste of personnel to change the bulbs and maintain the system and last is the neighbors who live in the area. Well they will get a benefit, on night when the parks are lit up they can save on their electric bills. They won’t have to turn on their lights. The glow of the parks will light up their homes. Oh, I almost forgot, they don’t believe in global warming or do they do since it will be warm longer into the nights and even in December people will be able to play outside, you need lights.

Of course they could have forgotten about the lights and have people go home after dark, but then families would have to spend some time together in their own homes.

Now don’t forget the next time someone from Planning and Zoning tells you, you have to follow the UDO, tell them you just voted yourself exempt just like the town did for itself.

Fishers Stormwater and Property Tax Sham

Well, folk’s you have been had again by the Fishers Town Council – The new Stormwater Management Advisory Board has had its first members appointed. For those of you that guessed it has been rigged – well your right. Here are the names David George – Member of Council, Dan Henke – Member of Council and Gary Huff – City Manager. Now for those of you that believe that Gary Huff would vote against the Town Council that fully controls and pays his salary you do not live in Fishers. For those of you that believe this will be an independent board you don’t live in Fishers. For those of you that believe they will be fair in setting the new TAX rate for storm water management, you don’t live in Fishers. For those of you that believe everything is above board and fair you must live in Fishers because you keep these people in office.

So here is why that Fishers claims its property taxes are lower, they just find another way to tax your property. Funny how that works use storm water to increase the property tax without calling it a property tax. Folks that is exactly what it is, you see you have to own property to be taxed for the storm water, so without property you don’t get taxed, with property you get taxed. But then don’t call it a tax; call it a fee for use of the storm water ditch, which the road department keeps clear. So now you have a new form of property tax, which is not even a tax but a fee based on the fact that you own property. Well to me it’s a property tax.

Why Fishers doesn’t care

Fishers Switch,IN
then
Mudsock, IN
then
Fishers, IN

Year Population

1963 350
2000 37,835
2004 52,390
2008 66,000?


I should say why the people who live in Fishers don’t care. You see Fishers has grown so fast it not yet a community, it’s just a place to live. I have to wonder how many people can say I have lived in the Town of Fishers 50 years, 40, 30, 20 or even 10 years. Even if they lived in the area that is now Fishers, it wasn’t Fishers a few years ago.

Maybe this is the root of the problems of the politics of Fishers, too many new people with no sense of community, too many young families with more of an allegiance to the HSE School System than to the community. The young families more concerned with the upkeep of a new family and a new home. More allegiance to the SPORTS program as it affects their children a lot more than the town government. They don’t have the time to worry about the town government, they are more worried about getting home and the traffic battles and they hope someone will solve the problem. There is a lack of older citizens that have grown up with the community to provide that sense of direction that many other towns and cities have. It’s these older folks in most towns that solve the problems, provide direction, which helps the government to solve their problems. But not in this community.

You can see it in the spending profile of the Town government, someone at the Geist public hearing said they were spending like “drunken Sailors” how true. The town folks have no idea how much they are spending and how it will affect them in years to come. The town government believes they can bail themselves out by building a bigger tax base. Turn the airport into a industrial park with lots of commercial concerns to bring in tax dollars, who cares about all the extra trucks on 96th street, turn the area around town hall into a major 100 million dollar tax base with no regard for the citizens or business already in the area, after all they don’t bring in a lot of money to the town, 100 million dollars will do nicely for the tax base. Then there is the Geist War of 2007 and the goose that can lay one golden egg year after year. Actually 2-3 millions dollars in income above spending every year to help bail them out. Forget Geist for a minute and look at all the other annexations, Fishers skips areas and creates a swiss cheese community by only annexing areas that would provide a positive income to the tax base, while very smart for the government, not smart for the people.

Citizens of Fishers, while you are very busy building your families, your government is actually failing you. Just like a person living beyond their means one day it will come crashing down on all of you. The Town Council won’t admit to you they are in trouble, instead they slowly raise taxes every year by the legal limit. When will you find out, it depends, it depends on all of you, and if you want to find out. Or you will all find out in 10-20 years when you send the kids off to college and have some time to start to view the Town Council and the government of Fisher. Please don’t wait.

Stu the Sewer Man

Council Member Stu should be called the Sewer Man
You all know about the Cable Guy made famous by Hollywood, well we are making Stu famous as the Sewer Man.

Another report to inform the Citizens of Fishers about one of your government leaders and how they work effectively to blackmail new property owners and try to convert some neighborhoods to allow annexation by Fishers.

As part of the effort to take over Geist Stu the SewerMan told some homeowners if they didn’t get annexed the sewer would be shut off. This needless to say has started a major debate between homeowners on the sewer system. They even hired a national expert in Aerospace Engineering to dig into the facts. Why an aerospace engineer, well he lives here and did it for nothing, since that is all this study was worth. The first view was r see if Fishers had installed TV or some other electronic monitoring devices next to each home with an automatic shut off valve that from the hidden confines of Town Hall could be shut of at each home – no hidden devices at the homes. The next step was to see if there were any in the street at the hook up – none. So here is where it got tricky, he study to determine if any other type of tracing was being done such as nuclear tracing such as a radiopharmaceutical agent that is administered into a vein, but in case into a sewer. No radioactive material was found. Hence the conclusion was no way can Stu figure out whose poop came from whom. Of course they was one loophole found and this that Stu could collect samples and do a DNA comparison for every person living in the area. Now considering he works for Lilly there may be more to this than we realize.

Well one of Stu’s hobbies is to visit neighborhoods to try and sell sewers in trade for signing off your civil rights to protest annexation. It almost like saying you want water, you will have to vote for me. And on top of that you will have to pay for the sewers and if 51% of your neighbors agree you have to pay for this even if you don’t need or want it. Now for you people who have not been in the sewer business for a while this is not cheap. We are talking about big bucks. In most cases about the size of a car sticker and it can go anywhere from mid size to a big SUV. In some cases it would be cheaper to buy that SUV put a big tank on it wait until it fills up and drive over to the sewer plant and dump it. At least that way you would also get an SUV and if you fill up with gas at the Flying J truck stop you can dump your waste free. What a deal.

Back to sewers: I have seen proposals that range from $13,000 to $45,000 and of course a lot has to do with how far they have to run the lines. So I will grant that one to them. Now for the smoke and mirrors. They are willing to give the homeowner a tax-free loan for 30 years to pay for the sewer. OK, Fishers homeowners any of you get tax free loans from the Town? Well someone has to pay for loaning the money and why would Fishers be so nice. The taxpayers of Fishers will have to pay for the loan, nice of you to loan money to your neighbors. Did you know that? Guess what, nothing is for nothing. Stu the Sewer Man is pulling a fast one on the taxpayers of Fishers. What a great guy.
Or could it be that the price quote for the sewer is a few thousand too high to make the money back and really is not tax-free. Sort of like that car loan the dealers always push.

Next is that loan a real 30-year loan or what is it. Is the amount they quote the real amount or is it?

All the Fishers proposals are incomplete, so before you sign away your rights and accept the Fishers used car deal do your self a real favor and investigate the entire deal. Don’t let a few neighbors tell you what to do. Be informed. Can everyone in your neighborhood afford this deal or will you force people to sell their homes? Can you afford the additional costs that Fishers has not told you about? Additional costs yes folks Stu the SewerMan has failed to tell you everything. So here is some more information:

1. You may or will have to remove or crush your old septic system, approx $5,000.00, it may be ok for now and might collapse later and have to repaired. Better check this out with a septic contactor.

2. Your sewer hook up does not include the actual hook up to your home $1,000 to $5,000. Maybe higher. Ask a plumber.

3. The lien will be due when you sell your home, no fits and buts. I have check with two mortgage companies and both said the exact same thing. A lien of this type is a loan and as such can’t be moved to the new owner unless part of the home loan, for it to be part of the home loan it has to be in the selling price, therefore it has to be paid off. So if someone has a $25,000 lien they will have to pay it off.

4. Your property tax will go up relative to the amount you pay for the sewer/water. This will be considered a value improvement to the property by the taxing district and your tax will increase.

5. Don’t forget you will be paying a sewer fee monthly.

6. If you have a grinder pit you are looking at $3,000 to $5,000 every 5-10 years. This is required on forced systems.

Hey Stu – Did I leave out anything.

Oh yes – If the Towns of Geist are formed as the people of Geist want the odds are they can do the same deal and knowing they seem to have lower taxes and a more efficient government maybe for a lot less.

Fishers to double in size by 2025

Folks Fishers is planning to double in size by 2025, and I want to know can you handle it? Can you handle the traffic, the pollution, crime, and schools that can’t be built fast enough, kids are already in trailers.
I know you don’t believe me, but it’s in their own documents.
In their development documents they plan on all the population including all areas not yet annexed “unincorporated areas” that will provide a population as follows:Town of Fishers Incorporated and Unincorporated Areas:Total Population as of July 1, 2007: 79,8412010 Estimated Population: 90,8522015 Estimated Population: 104,3352020 Estimated Population: 114,0982025 Estimated Population: 120,255
Does this mean Fishers is going to fill up all the land south of Noblesville until they stop at the county line. Looks like it. They are planning to do just that.
So if you double the population, you have to double the school system, you have to double the traffic problems, you have to double the sewer plant, etc and based on Fishers Town government, you have to at least triple its size. Get ready for more taxes. Want to see how much your area is going to grow go to http://www.fishers.in.us/egov/docs/1194383590_581390.pdf
Now I don’t know about you, but I sure don’t want to see the area double in population and everything that, that brings.
Its time to slow down the Fishers Town Council and make them responsible for their actions instead of letting them just ignore everyone to allow for unchecked growth. To allow them to do as they please and ignore the citizens of the area. It also says by 2027 no more land will be left. Watch them then grow upwards with more multi-story buildings after all they already approved two 25-story monsters.
Funny they still want you to believe this is a small town, just so they can keep their power. I wonder in 2025 will they still want to be called a small town of 120,000 people? Would that make them the largest town in the USA? Or would they be a town of only 100,000 which is reduced by the 20,000 they project for the Geist area? When Geist wins it ‘s battle to be free it would bring them down a bit in size. Which bring me to another point; they claim that the Geist area does not have enough area to grow, so how did they figure it would go from 5,000 to 20,000? Fisher’s magic at work once more.

Home Values Drop - Will property taxes?

According to the National Association of Realtors prices dropped 2.7 percent in the fourth quarter and that is on top of a 1 percent drop in the past year. That’s a 3.7 percent drop in the past year nationwide. With the number of houses for sale and coming onto the market as a result on continuing foreclosures the prices will drop some more. The Indianapolis market is ranked number 4 in the nation in foreclosures. Most recent MIBOR statistics show Hamilton County home sales down 23.1% in September 2006 compared to September 2005. According to the Washington Post in an article on Dec 29,2007 the current decline over the last 12 months in a 10 city index is 6.7%. They also state “Compounding this adverse trend is the fact that the rate of price deterioration has been getting worse.”
This brings up a very interesting question. Our property taxes are based on the assessed value of our homes. If the market shows a decline, will the assessment go down? OK this government, unless we the citizens force the issue I doubt in fact by some strange sense of reasoning they will go up instead. In Maricopa County, Arizona the county assessor has stated some owners will actually see their vales go down this year. In California you can file out a form and claim the reduction based on assessed value reductions.
Let us assume for a minute, no just a second, our assessor lowers our values by 6.7%, what will happen to our schools and governments. They are going to be hurt quite a bit. Fishers is already spending beyond its means and this will put them in a lot of trouble, our school district may have to stop before building its new administration building. I have a novel idea, put the admin people in trailers instead of students. FEMA has a lot of them for sale cheap.
If you and I have to slow down spending we do, if governments get less money they raise taxes. Anyone want to take a bet – if assessed values go down, they will file for a tax rate increase?
If the home values continue to drop maybe we should start to put pressure on the assessors to lower our values. Maybe we need to put pressure on the local government to slow down. Fishers could stop spending money on lawyers and experts to fight Geist. The odds are they are going to spend a million dollars in this fight.
Hopefully our assessor reads this and takes action without us having to picket their offices and file suit against them. Wouldn’t that be fun a class action suit against the assessors?
Now if our state government can get its act together and accomplish property tax reform, the ups and downs of value of the housing market will not have such a major effect. We can always hope.

Letter to elected officials

I keep reading about Special Interest Groups and the effect on our elected officials. So this is an open letter to all our Senators, Representatives, Mayors, Council Members and the Governor. The next time one of the lobbyists, lawyers etc from a special interest group approaches you for a favor, or to give you a gift, or take you to lunch, etc. Please inform them that you already represent another special interest group – the Citizens of the State of Indiana.

Elected officials you were elected by the people, isn’t it time you represented the people.