Archive
February 11th, 2011
INDIANAPOLIS — As just one of three freshmen in the 50-meter freestyle race at the Indiana high school state final’s opening day Friday, Lady Eagle Andrea Richter made her debut in 30th-place.
Columbia City’s only sectional champion in girls’ swimming went into the event seeded 29th out of 32 swimmers.
Richter swam to a time of 25.87 in the first of four qualifying heats. The top 16 swimmers moved on to today’s finals at the Indiana University Natatorium on the IUPUI campus.
COLUMBIA CITY — We have all seen sporting events where a team digs a themselves a big hole to start the game only to come back with a furious rally to win at the end.
Friday night’s class 3A sectional semifinal between the host Columbia City Lady Eagles and the NorthWood Lady Panthers was not that game.
The winner of South Whitley’s Got Talent hands down was Ivory West.
The competition concluded Thursday evening at the South Whitley Public Library after a week off for a winter storm.
The competition was tough, with the audience getting to be a part of selecting the winner. The three official judges, whose votes had a bit more pull, were Nate Myers, Teresa Smith and Renee Wozniak Anderson.
West performed “Come Together” by The Beatles to earn the title.
Kimberlina (Ickes) Heintzelman of Columbia City passed away Feb. 3, 2011 at Fort Wayne Hospice, to be with her Lord. Her family hopes she is at peace and no longer in pain.
She was born in Bakersfield, Calif. in 1965. She grew up in Mammoth Lakes, Calif. and graduated from high school there. She was married twice and had no children.
COLUMBIA CITY — Earlier this week, county government officials OK’d a monetary allocation for the county’s public transportation system — the amount just wasn’t as much as was requested.
Jackie Hake, executive director of Whitley County Transit asked the county’s board of commissioners and county council for $20,000.
What she got was half that amount.
Hake was before both panels asking for her organization’s annual allotment of money from the County Economic Development Income Tax — an infusion of $20,000 as part of a local match with the Indiana Department of Transportation.
COLUMBIA CITY — With questions, confusion and downright dissension surrounding who will collect money from the Amish for their buggy plates, Whitley County’s auditor, Jen McGuire stepped up, volunteered and put the dicey issue to bed once and for all.
In January, the Whitley County Board of Commissioners voted unanimously to give the responsibility to County Assessor Angela Adams.
The change came about as a result of differences in assessing duties as mandated by state law.
COLUMBIA CITY — The Whitley County Consolidated School Corporation has tough decisions ahead of it, according to Superintendent Dr. Patricia O’Connor.
“It was obvious that our expenditures were outpacing our revenues,” O’Connor said at Monday’s regular meeting of the corporation’s Board of School Trustees.
She said the 2010 General Fund Budget took a hit of $1,085,488 due to the economy.
“This reduction will not be restored,” she said.
“In order for WCCS to operate within its means and maintain an adequate fund balance, additional budget cuts are required.”
SOUTH WHITLEY — The best spellers of the county elementary and middle schools converged on South Whitley Elementary School Thursday evening to compete for the title Whitley County Spelling Bee Champion.
Janice M. Waikel, 83, passed away Thursday, Feb. 10, 2011 at Millers Merry Manor in Columbia City.
Surviving are her daughters, Jannelle (Butch) Kelly, Alica (Richard) Sherman and Patricia (Jay) Greer; 11 grandchildren; 18 great-grandchildren; and daughter-in-law, JoAnn Waikel.
She was preceded in death by her husband, Donald Waikel; parents, John and Madeline Galloway; and son, David Waikel.
COLUMBIA CITY — Columbia City’s Common Council got a crash course in 800 MHz radios Tuesday night at its regular board meeting.
Ted Hurley of J&K Communica-tions gave the board and the city’s various department heads a slide presentation on 800 MHz technology that’s sweeping the nation’s emergency response airwaves.
According to Hurley, although Columbia City is still slightly behind the rest of the county in changing over to the 800 MHz system from the old VHF technology, it won’t matter for awhile anyway.
