About Vanderburgh County, IN

Garbage crews will begin picking up "heavy trash" from Evansville residents later this month.

The collections will run from Sept. 14 to Oct. 16. The city considers heavy trash to consist of sofas, tables, chairs, mattresses, refrigerators, washing machines, dryers, televisions, stereos, building materials and similar things.

For the collection, the city has divided the city into a number of areas. Crews will spend one day picking up heavy trash in each of the areas.

To see a map showing the collection schedule, go to HeavyTrash.

To be picked up, items must be put out before 6 a.m. on the collection day.

The heavy trash should be set in the same place where normal trash is collected. Building materials or debris must be placed in trash cans or boxes. The containers should be light enough to be lifted by two adults.

No concrete blocks or steel poles will be collected. Sections of fencing should be cut in half or to a smaller size.

The work crews will not pick up trash that can be set out for normal collections. Nor will they accept automobile parts, batteries, tires, computer equipment or hazardous substances. For more information, call Allied Waste at (812) 424-3345.

Source: http://www.courierpress.com/news/2009/sep/02/02web-HeavyTrash/

Later this month, drivers going east or west on Newburgh Road will find themselves stopping at Burkhardt Road.

In August, local officials approved turning the intersection there into a four-way stop. That change will require placing two stop signs on Newburgh Road, work that crews plan to undertake in the next couple of weeks.

The purpose is to make the intersection safer, said Brad Mills, the executive director of the Evansville Metropolitan Planning Organization. Mills said a study conducted in March found that 303 vehicles passed through there on Newburgh Road each hour. For Burkhardt, the frequency was 281 an hour.

Both counts exceeded the minimums required for stop signs to be installed at an intersection. Their concerns raised, officials next turned to accident reports.

Mills said they found 45 crashes had occurred at the intersection between Sept. 2003 and April 2009. Of those, many were "t-bones," in which a vehicle traveling Burkhardt had been hit on the side while crossing Newburgh.

Mills estimated that a four-way stop would help to prevent 87 percent of the crashes there.

Such is the hope of Rusti VonderHaar, who complained to local officials about Newburgh and Burkhardt roads about three years ago. Two of the intersection's features give rise to her fears: its being on a hill and its being formed with Newburgh Road on a diagonal.

Both make it difficult for drivers on Burkhardt to see cross traffic, VonderHaar said.

"That intersection, because of its curvature, is extremely dangerous," she said.

Still, she wondered if traffic lights wouldn't serve the purpose better. Stop signs present their own difficulties, she said.

"People can never figure out whose turn it is to go," VonderHaar said.

Others think they have a better way to make the intersection safer: simply cut down the hill on Burkhardt Road. Joe Kiefer, who sits on the Metropolitan Planning Organization's board, said that change would prevent further congestion.

Newburgh Road between Interstate 164 and Green River Road is one of the few stretches in Evansville where drivers can travel east or west without having to stop often, Kiefer said.

"Putting that four-way stop there, to me, ruins a nice little transportation artery," Kiefer said.

Mills said that is one way to look at it. Another is to consider the drivers on Burkhardt Road, who now must sometimes wait a long time for a gap in traffic on Newburgh Road.

Besides, Mills said, lowering the hill would have no effect on traffic counts, which would still dictate that a four-way stop be installed.

"And that's much more expensive than putting up a couple of signs," he said.

Even so, Mills concedes that adding stop signs may lead to other troubles, at least in the short run.

More vehicles, for one, may be rear-ended since drivers on Newburgh Road won't at first expect a stop at Burkhardt. To prevent such crashes, officials plan to install secondary signs that alert drivers to the approaching changes.

"But cutting down the hill would not solve the problem," Mills said.

Source: http://www.courierpress.com/news/2009/sep/08/08web-Newburgh/

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is joining forces with the Evansville Levee Authority this week to assess the integrity of the city's 27 miles of flood protection levees and their pumping stations.

The Evansville levee system, begun after the disastrous 1937 flood, is designed to protect the city from the floodwaters of the Ohio River and is divided into seven sections.

Construction of the Knight and Howell levee - the city's first - began in 1939 and was completed in 1948. The newest section, along Pigeon Creek on the city's North Side, was added in 1994. The Federal Emergency Management Agency began calling for the certification of levee systems throughout the country in 2007 in response to levee failures at New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina

By FEMA regulations, levee systems must provide protection from an annual 1 percent flood chance, often referred to as a 100-year flood. FEMA also uses the information to formulate new flood insurance rate maps.

Jay Perry, superintendent of the Evansville Levee Authority, said monthly inspections are made to the system, but he added that the FEMA certification inspection process is much more intense and expensive.

The inspection process alone will cost the Levee Authority $408,000.

"It's a lot more thorough than our other inspections we've had, too," Perry said. "They're looking at everything from Point A to Point B and everything in between."

The 28 Corps engineers operate in teams that review the geotechnical, structural, mechanical, electrical and hydraulic aspects of the levees.

Daniel Frank, the Corps' levee safety program manager, said the inspections are just "the field scenario portion" of the accreditation process, which he expects to end Friday.

After the inspections and field reports, Frank said, the Corps will have until Nov. 12 to report to FEMA.

If Evansville's levee system fails to meet accreditation requirements, Frank said the levee authority then would have 18 months to meet the regulations before being classified as unaccredited. Such a classification could lead to FEMA deeming the area a flood zone.

"If that were the case, people who don't have to pay for flood insurance now may have to pay for it in the future," Perry said. "Hopefully, it won't come to that here. We have a few things here that aren't perfect, but that's with anything."

At the river stage of 26 feet, station pumps begin dumping rain and storm water into the Ohio River, Perry said.

"Our pumping season is from November to June. Sometimes we pump into July. This year, the river came up in August, so it really all depends on weather conditions."

The levee sections have 19 pumping stations that include 55 pumps.

Perry said small units can pump about 1,000 gallons of water per minute, and the larger units can process 143,000 gallons per minute.

In addition to paying for the inspections, Perry said, the Levee Authority will spend $100,000 to clean six miles of pipes at the pump station locations. The process must be videotaped and sent to FEMA for further assessment.

Source: http://www.courierpress.com/news/2009/sep/03/inspectors-making-sure-levees-will-keep-city-dry/

The former Welborn Baptist Hospital building in downtown Evansville is headed to the auction block.
St. Mary's owns the building, but officials said they haven't used it for anything in three years.
And, now the hospital system wants out.
The biggest part of the property is this hospital building and the land it's on.
But, St. Mary's is also including two other disconnected parking lots.
Kurtz Auction and Realty is running the bid process.
Interested parties can make bids through October 22.
And, there will be a final decision on October 28.
Tim Flesch, St. Mary's CEO, said he doesn't know if anyone's interested yet nor how much money people would be willing to pay for the site.
And, Jason Blue, with Kurtz, said there's no minimum bid.
So, if high bid is one dollar, then that's how much the winner will pay for the property.
Commercial developers across the region are now asking themselves if they can make a profit by owning the old Welborn Baptist Hospital.
The medical system is eager to get it off the books.
St. Mary's spends hundreds of thousands of dollars on it each year.
And, the building hasn't even been used since 2006.
"We do pay real estate taxes on it. I don't know those numbers," Flesch said. "We still have it insured. We maintain the grass and the facility and the building. And, we have heat, light, power still on at the levels necessary to maintain the building."
But, how much the property costs for St. Mary's to own right now and how much its worth to a commercial developer could be two very different numbers.
"There's some value there," said Jason Blue, with Kurtz Auction and Realty. "But, it's tough to determine what that value is."
The bids will determine exactly what that value is, especially because there's no minimum bid.
Commercial developers FOX 7 spoke with had mixed feelings about the property.
Some said it was a good building with a lot of potential.
Others said there are so many questions about the property they'd be hesitant about bidding.
One of the potential issues in selling this property is that the Welborn building actually shares some of its utilities with the one next door. And, that one isn't on the auction block nor owned by St. Mary's. Just think about that. What if you and your next door neighbor had the same furnace to heat your homes?
Another possible issue, it was built as a hospital.
Moving forward, the new owner can't use it that way.
"We don't believe we need another acute care facility in town, another acute care hospital. So, a restriction is that it can't be turned into that," said Flesch.
But, that doesn't exclude the possibility of putting in a nursing home or assisted living facility - the path that might be easiest for a developer to handle.
Speaking of nursing home facilities, there's one that's been in the news a lot recently, Riverwalk Communities, which currently uses the McCurdy Building.
The plan is to move the residents to the old Knights of Columbus building.
Ben Kunkel, whose company is working that space, said going into this space instead is not a realistic option.

Source: http://tristatehomepage.com/content/fulltext/?cid=92401

According to published reports, the Internal Revenue Service is more closely examining how taxpayers are reporting mortgage interest deductions.

The IRS is reportedly examining some returns with high deductions for mortgage interest and enforcing obscure rules that most home owners and many accountants could be unfamiliar with.

The calculations are very complex and rely on precise records that some home owners may have trouble producing

Experts advise home buyers who have borrowed more than $1 million in mortgages and home equity loans since 1987, the year deductibility limits were enacted, to consult a tax expert because the newest loan may not be tax deductible.

Source: Investment News Daily, Art Auerbach (08/25/2009)

Source: http://www.realtor.org/RMODaily.nsf/pages/News2009082606?OpenDocument