The Crothersville Community Comprehensive Plan should be ready for review by the committee who has been working on the plan since the first of the year, the Crothersville Town Council learned during their November meeting last Tuesday.
Trena Carter of ARa in Columbus advised the council that Houseal Lavene should have the final plan available before Thanksgiving. The council plans to hold a public hearing on the plan at their Dec. 2 meeting. The plan would be adopted at a special meeting on Wednesday, Dec. 11.
The comprehensive plan is a listing of the needs of the town and methods of achieving those needs for improving quality of life in Crothersville. The plan can then be used to help obtain government grants.
The town’s widely accepted voting limits have now been officially adopted by the council. The ordinance provides for the town’s voting area to be those residents who live inside the town limits.
The voting has always been this way but an annexation of property approved in December 1997 brought some residents in the Vernon South precinct into the town’s voting area. The issue was problematic for the county and residents of the newly annexed areas in that for town elections, a separate listing of voters in Vernon South also needed to be available to accommodate that 10 or so voters. For general elections those Vernon South voters did not vote in the town precinct but the Vernon South precinct.
With the new ordinance, that confusion will be cleared and all registered voters of Crothersville will vote in the same precinct.
In another matter, the old town barn that is in violation of the town’s derelict building ordinance, may soon be coming down…maybe.
The pole building, located near the town’s water tower, has metal siding that is rusting away, according to one town worker.
“It’s not used for anything but storing stuff we haven’t had any use for in 15 years,” said Wastewater Superintendent Mason Boicourt.
Despite that assessment, Lenvel ‘Butch’ Robinson and Derrick Minton were reluctant to approve its razing.
“If the building is structurally sound, maybe we should just put some new metal on it and keep it for town’s use,” said Robinson.
The two council members voted to table a decision until the December meeting.
However, two no longer used pickup trucks were sold by the town after opening sealed bids. John Shirley of Crothersville was the successful bidder for a 2000 Chevrolet S-10 for $551 and a 2000 Chevy Silverado for $527. A total of seven bidders took part in the sale.
At a request by resident Cory Strong, the town’s Golf Cart and ATV ordinance was amended to allow properly equipped golf carts 24-hour use of the town’s streets. Currently golf carts can only be used during daylight hours.
The council amended the ordinance to allow nighttime driving on town streets if golf carts had headlights, and brake & tail lights. The amendment passed 2-0.
The council gave their approval to the local Lions Club to hold a Christmas parade on Friday, Nov. 30, during the community holiday kickoff.
The parade would begin at the Crothersville Christian Church, so south on Preston, west on Howard and disband at the former town hall location on West Howard Street.
The “Christmas in the ‘Ville” celebration will include a tree lighting at the Methodist Church commons at the stoplight and ‘Cookies and Carols’ at Hamacher Hall, according to local Lions Club member Brenda Holzworth.
