Captain is a 6-month-old male brown tabby! He and his siblings were found as strays just before Christmas. They received names from “The Nutcracker & the Four Realms.†His adoption fee is $40 and includes his neuter, microchip, first vaccines & deworming, and more. Contact Vanderburgh Humane at (812) 426-2563 for adoption details!
HOT JOBS IN EVANSVILLE
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Gov. Holcomb Makes Appointments to Various Boards and Commissions
Governor Eric J. Holcomb today announced several new appointments and reappointments to various state boards and commissions.
 Board of Registration for Architects & Landscape Architects
The governor made two reappointments to the board, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2023:
- Hal Kovert (Jeffersonville), principal at Kovert Hawkins Architects
- Debra Schmucker (Indianapolis), president and CEO of Cornerstone PDS
 The governor also made two new appointments to the board, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2023:
- Lisa Gomperts (Indianapolis), project manager and principal at Schmidt Associates
- Todd Scoggins (Indianapolis), architect at Scoggins Design, Inc.
 Domestic Violence Prevention & Treatment Council
The governor made one new appointment to the council, who will serve until April 30, 2021:
- Amy Blackett (Indianapolis), DV/SA Resource Prosecutor with IPAC
 Indiana Board of Tax Review
The governor made one reappointment to the board:
- Ted Holaday (Indianapolis), who will serve until Dec. 31, 2023
 Indiana Economic Development Corporation Board of Directors
The governor made two reappointments to the board, who will serve until April 30, 2023:
- Dominic Grote (Madison), president and CEO of Grote Industries
- Mark Neal (South Bend), principal of Bradley Company
 Indiana Horse Racing Commission
The governor made two reappointments to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2023:
- Susie Lightle (Greenfield), retired
- George Pillow (Indianapolis), founder of Pillow Logistics, Inc.
 Indiana Real Estate Commission
The governor made two reappointments to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2023:
- James Litten (Carmel), president of F.C. Tucker Company
- Douglas Rose (Carmel), president of Irwin R. Rose & Co., LLC
 The governor also made two new appointments to the commission:
- John De Souza (South Bend), president of Cressy & Everett Real Estate, will serve until July 31, 2021
- Donna Spears (Richmond), associate broker at Coldwell Banker Lingle, will serve until Dec. 31, 2023
 Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission
The governor made one reappointment to the commission:
- David Ober (Indianapolis), who will serve until Jan. 31, 2024
 Indiana Veterans Affairs Commission
The governor made one new appointment to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2020:
- Richard Leirer (Carmel), a surgeon with the VFW Department of Indiana
 Indiana War Memorials Commission
The governor made three reappointments to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2022:
- Charles Dodson (Brownsburg), a starch handler with National Starch & Chemical Company, LLC
- Lawrence Long (South Whitley), vice president of John McCormack Co., Inc.
- Carol Mutter (Indianapolis), Lt. Gen. (Ret.) of the United States Marine Corps
Northern Indiana Commuter Transportation District Board
The governor made two new appointments to the board:
- Jerome Prince, mayor of the City of Gary, who will serve until May 31, 2020
- Jim Arnold, former state senator and current member of the LaPorte Community School board, who will serve until May 31, 2021
 Serve Indiana Commission
The governor made seven reappointments to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2021:
- Kathryn Clayton (Commiskey), director of the Labor Institute for Training
- Jane Crady (Waldron), coordinator of disaster preparedness and response with Catholic Charities, Archdiocese of Indianapolis
- Mark Eutsler (Linden), principal of The Edge
- Media Oakes (Avon), manager of communications at Calumet Specialty Products Partners, L.P.
- David Reingold (West Lafayette), Justin S. Morrill Dean of Liberal Arts & Professor of Sociology at Purdue University
- Stefanie Sebastian (Brownsburg), education specialist with the National FFA Organization
- Sarah Waddle (Indianapolis), executive director of AARP Indiana
The governor also made six new appointments to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2022:
- Erin Busk (Indianapolis), 21st CCLC Grant Specialist with the Indiana Department of Education, as Superintendent Dr. Jennifer McCormick’s designee
- Shannon Frederick (Indianapolis), executive director of Multiplying Good
- Laura Hodges (Madison), former city councilor of the City of Madison and retired administrative assistant with Dockside Services, Inc.
- Brian Sheehan (Rushville), director of special projects and community development
- Matthew Stachler (Fort Wayne), the senior at R. Nelson Snider High School, representing 16-25-year-old volunteers
- Jo Yocum (Indianapolis), executive director of Playworks
 State Ethics Commission
The governor made one new appointment to the commission, who will serve until Dec. 31, 2023:
- Rafael Sanchez (Fishers), president of private banking at Old National Bank
 Statewide Domestic Violence Fatality Review Committee
The governor made one new appointment to the committee, who will serve until July 31, 2022:
- Jon Frain (Winamac), Pulaski County coroner
 Statewide Independent Living Council
The governor made two reappointments to the council, who will serve until June 30, 2023:
- Kevin Burk (Salem), Washington County coordinator with the Southern Indiana Center for Independent Living
- Derek Deckman (Brownsburg), RVP at Salesforce
The governor also made one new appointment to the council, who will serve until June 30, 2023:
- Kelsey Cowley (Bloomington), past president of Self-Advocates of Indiana
Commentary: The Senate’s Strange Aversion Of Searching For The Truth
Commentary: The Senate’s Strange Aversion Of Searching For The Truth
TheStatehouseFile.comÂ
INDIANAPOLIS – The truth, it seems, won’t set President Donald Trump-free.
That’s what the opening skirmishing over the rules regarding the president’s impeachment trial in the U.S. Senate has made clear.
Democrats, almost 70 percent of the public and, somewhat surprisingly, a small plurality of Republicans want the trial to include witnesses and to have the White House produce requested documents.
The president doesn’t want witnesses. Nor does he want to release documents pertaining to his administration’s contacts with Ukraine’s government.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, has tried to stand with the president on this. He drafted a set of trial procedures that would have done a Soviet bureaucrat proud.
They were so draconian that 15 or so GOP senators – perhaps mindful that not even a majority of Republican voters supported the Trump/McConnell stonewall – pushed back. McConnell relented and relaxed the rules.
And the president railed at an impromptu press conference that, once again, the whole thing was a witch hunt.
To those who are not part of the Trump cult or, for that matter, not rabid partisans on either side, the whole thing seems more than a little bizarre.
To most rational people, the solution seems obvious:
Release the relevant documents. Let the Democrats call the witnesses they want. Let the Republicans and the president call the witnesses they want.
Each side should make a case.
Then we’ll sort out what happened and decide what we want, should or must do.
But, again, that’s the way reasonable people approach things.
It’s certainly not the way things get done in the Trump world, where truth often is viewed as an obstacle rather than a virtue.
Democrats haven’t helped themselves in making the case that finding the truth is the true goal.
The Democrats’ reluctance to let Republicans call Hunter Biden is mystifying. If the GOP wants to turn the president’s defense into a sideshow, they should be allowed to do so. Most Americans are going to be smart enough to see through that.
Besides, the best guess is that even the sharpest questioning of former Vice President Joe Biden’s remaining son is going to reveal he is nothing more than an amiable oaf who has coasted through life trading on his last name.
If Republicans somehow manage to transform that into a punishable crime, then President Trump’s own should consider themselves also eligible for stays in less-resplendent government housing than they currently occupy.
The question here is not really about whether Donald Trump should be removed from office. The chances that 20 Republican senators will break ranks and vote to convict him are still somewhere between nil and non-existent.
But there are many Americans – including many Republicans – who are troubled by what the president did regarding Ukraine. They want answers and, in a self-governing society, they’re entitled to have them.
The members of Congress who prevent the public from getting those answers do their offices and their constituents a tremendous disservice. These elected officials are supposed to be the people’s representatives and servants, not the president’s lapdogs.
An aside: Given their slavish, full-throated and unquestioning defense of everything President Trump does, wouldn’t it be cheaper and more efficient for Hoosiers just to put a cardboard cut-out of the president at the desks of Sen. Mike Braun, R-Indiana, and Rep. Jim Banks, R-Indiana? We could let the president cast their votes for them and issue their press releases. That way, the taxpayers would save money on Braun’s and Banks’ salaries and office expenses by eliminating the middlemen.
This trial in the Senate will not result in Donald Trump leaving office.
But it can and should be a vehicle for Americans to find out exactly what this president is doing in their name and with the authority they grant him. It also will tell them if there are any lines or laws he is willing to respect.
That’s the knowledge – and the truth – President Trump fears.
As he should.
It’s not likely to flatter him.
But it just might set the country free.
FOOTNOTE: John Krull is director of Franklin College’s Pulliam School of Journalism and publisher of TheStatehouseFile.com, a news website powered by Franklin College journalism students.
Campaign Fraud Case Implicates Indy Gaming Firm—But Who Is It?
Campaign Fraud Case Implicates Indy Gaming Firm—But Who Is It? |
| News that a Republican strategist in Maryland pleaded guilty on Thursday to conspiracy in what investigators say was a scheme to funnel money from an Indianapolis-based gaming company to an Indiana congressional candidate raises more questions than prosecutors seem ready to answer.
And you have to think there are some folks in Indy getting pretty nervous. The campaign in question was former state Sen. Brent Waltz‘s bid for the GOP nomination in the 9th District in 2016. Waltz told IBJ late Thursday he was not aware of any illegal donations to the unsuccessful campaign and said he’s been fully cooperating with investigators. And it seems the Republican strategist in Maryland—Chip O’Neil—is cooperating, too. In court, he admitted that at least eight people, including his girlfriend, were used as conduits for illegal corporate donations from the Indianapolis gaming company to the House campaign. And the plea agreement calls for O’Neil to spill his guts about what he knows. Lots of people are named in the charging documents and O’Neil’s plea agreement—but not the Indianapolis gaming company. Neither is the company’s vice president and general counsel, who is accused in the filings of helping to set up the scheme to “evade the restrictions of corporate contributions to campaigns, to evade the limits placed on money that individuals could contribute to a campaign, and to disguise the fact that the gaming corporation was the true source of the funds.” But those names could be revealed soon as the case moves forward and O’Neil provides information in exchange for a lighter sentence. No doubt there are plenty of folks waiting to see where the dominos fall. Meanwhile, IBJ has the details on what prosecutors have revealed so far about the Indiana case and how it fits into a larger crackdown on fraudulent political action committees. |
AG Curtis Hill: Trump Administration’s New Waters Rule A Commonsense Win For Indiana
Attorney General Curtis Hill today welcomed the Trump administration’s new environmental rule on navigable waters, which replaces previous language that threatened the states’ rightful authority to regulate land and water resources within their own borders.
“The final Navigable Waters Protection Rule appropriately replaces the Obama-era rule that expanded the definition of ‘waters of the United States’ to include land areas that only get wet when it rains,†Attorney General Hill said. “This broad designation allowed federal authorities to claim jurisdiction over private property in Indiana.â€
Since taking office in 2017, Attorney General Hill has worked to roll back federal overreach.
“Hours after I had the privilege of meeting President Trump at the White House in February of 2017,†Attorney General Hill said, “he announced an executive order directing federal authorities to review the Waters of the United States rule. This action demonstrated his resolve to properly balance environmental protection, economic growth and the constitutional roles of the U.S. Congress and the individual states.â€
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of the Army announced the new rule on Jan. 23. More information, including a pre-publication version of the Federal Register notice and fact sheets, is available at:Â https://www.epa.gov/nwpr.
EPA And Army Deliver On President Trump’s Promise To Issue The Navigable Waters Protection Rule
At the National Association of Home Builders International Builders’ Show in Las Vegas, EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler and Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works R.D. James will announce a new, clear definition for “waters of the United States.†With the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of the Army (Army) are delivering on President Trump’s promise to finalize a revised definition for “waters of the United States†that protects the nation’s navigable waters from pollution and will result in economic growth across the country.
“EPA and the Army are providing much needed regulatory certainty and predictability for American farmers, landowners, and businesses to support the economy and accelerate critical infrastructure projects,†said EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler. “After decades of landowners relying on expensive attorneys to determine what water on their land may or may not fall under federal regulations, our new Navigable Waters Protection Rule strikes the proper balance between Washington and the states in managing land and water resources while protecting our nation’s navigable waters, and it does so within the authority Congress provided.â€
“Having farmed American land myself for decades, I have personally experienced the confusion regarding implementation of the scope of the Clean Water Act,†said R.D. James, Assistant Secretary of the Army for Civil Works. “Our rule takes a common-sense approach to implementation to eliminate that confusion. This rule also eliminates federal overreach and strikes the proper balance between federal protection of our Nation’s waters and state autonomy over their aquatic resources. This will ensure that land-use decisions are not improperly constrained, which will enable our farmers to continue feeding our Nation and the world, and our businesses to continue thriving.â€
The Navigable Waters Protection Rule ends decades of uncertainty over where federal jurisdiction begins and ends. For the first time, EPA and the Army are recognizing the difference between federally protected wetlands and state-protected wetlands. It adheres to the statutory limits of the agencies’ authority. It also ensures that America’s water protections – among the best in the world – remain strong, while giving our states and tribes the certainty to manage their waters in ways that best protect their natural resources and local economies.
The revised definition identifies four clear categories of waters that are federally regulated under the Clean Water Act: the territorial seas and traditional navigable waters, like the Atlantic Ocean and the Mississippi River; perennial and intermittent tributaries, such as College Creek, which flows to the James River near Williamsburg, Virginia; certain lakes, ponds, and impoundments, such as Children’s Lake in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania; and wetlands that are adjacent to jurisdictional waters.
These four categories protect the nation’s navigable waters and the core tributary systems that flow into those waters.
This final action also details what waters are not subject to federal control, including features that only contain water in direct response to rainfall; groundwater; many ditches, including most farm and roadside ditches; prior converted cropland; farm and stock watering ponds; and waste treatment systems.
The final definition achieves the proper relationship between the federal government and states in managing land and water resources. The agencies’ Navigable Waters Protection Rule respects the primary role of states and tribes in managing their own land and water resources. All states have their own protections for waters within their borders and many already regulate more broadly than the federal government. This action gives states and tribes more flexibility in determining how best to manage their land and water resources while protecting the nation’s navigable waters as intended by Congress when it enacted the Clean Water Act.
Despite prior reports, there are no data or tools that can accurately map or quantify the scope of “waters of the United States.†This is the case today, and it was the case in 2014 when the Obama Administration issued its blog titled “Mapping the Truth.â€Â Therefore, any assertions attempting to quantify changes in the scope of waters based on these data sets are far too inaccurate and speculative to be meaningful. While this Administration agrees that the current data and tools are insufficient, we are committed to supporting the development and improvement of the technology needed to map the nation’s aquatic resources.
This final action is informed by robust public outreach and engagement on the Navigable Waters Protection Rule, including pre-proposal engagement that generated more than 6,000 recommendations and approximately 620,000 comments received on the proposal. The final definition balances the input the agencies received from a wide range of stakeholders.
IS ANYONE LISTENING?
IS ANYONE LISTENING?
Gavel Gamut By Jim Redwine
One judge bragged he could look an attorney right in the eye the whole time the attorney was making an argument but never hear a word the lawyer said. In fact, that judge was just like the rest of us. Much of what we appear to hear may as well be a foreign language. We smile and nod but are totally unaffected by much of what others try to convince us. And, of course, we all know very little that we say to others has any hope of convincing them to truly agree with us, even as they nod their heads up and down. If you are married, you might feel the truth, and frustration, of this phenomenon.
It is not just the state of my ability to hear that prevents me, and probably you too, from comprehending what someone in a movie, on television or even someone right next to us in a noisy room is saying. Just as a traffic cop continues politely filling out your citation while he does not consider your reasonable explanation, most of us already have our minds made up about practically everything. Therefore, please do not attempt to confuse us with information on the subject at hand.
In many situations, it is not our fault that new facts are irrelevant to our decisions. Take our hypothetical traffic cop for instance. He/she often has but a moment to observe some fleeting situation. He/she may have an ill child or a demanding spouse or be behind on his/her rent. What he/she does not have is the time or inclination to debate with you.
The same thing happens with judges. By the time a case gets to court the judge may have already read the file including briefs and depositions. The judge may have predetermined his/her decision and arguments in court are simply something that must be endured, not listened to. Trial judges often believe that is exactly how appellate court decisions are made.
Regardless of your circumstances, you may feel no one is hearing what you want to say. Actually, others may hear us but they just have their minds made up and the competing demands of our busy lives drive out our ability or desire to reevaluate our positions.
That may be why the same sermons get delivered at almost every religious service and why parents have to constantly admonish their children to do their homework. We hear but we do not listen. We see but we do not comprehend. The constant drumbeat of others attempting to confuse us with their thoughts eventually becomes just so much “sounding brass or tinkling cymbalsâ€. 1 Corinthians 13:1.
So the next time you grab someone’s arm and ask intently, “Are you listening to me?â€, you can almost certainly assume they are not. On the other hand, you can hope they will at least smile and politely nod in response.
For more Gavel Gamut articles go to www.jamesmredwine.com
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