Author: Charlie Smith

2024 Parade Traffic Notice:

Please note road closures as part of the 2024 Sellersburg Celebrates Parade. Beginning approx. 10am thru Noon on 8/24/24, ALL cross streets along the parade route will be closed. This includes US31 and New Albany Streets.

Please detour via using St. Joe East between Speed and SR60 or Salem-Noble Road between CR403 and SR62 during this time.

https://www.sellersburgcelebrates.org

Click HERE for printable image.

Information Regarding Solicitors:
It’s that time of the year where door-to-door solicitors may come knocking. The Town of Sellersburg does have a licensing requirement for this activity. Details can be found here: Click HERE to review the Solicitation Licensing Ordinance

The goal of this ordinance, first and foremost, is for the safety of our residents. That is why there are background checks required as part of the licensing process. In addition, this ordinance is meant to protect property owners and their peace at home from unwanted salespeople, most who, unfortunately, have taken to high pressure tactics. This was adopted in February of 2023 and does not impact kids selling Girl or Boy Scouts items, school fundraisers, etc.

If you have a solicitor approach you, ask them for their license. If you or your neighborhood has a “No Solicitors” sign posted, even if they have a license, they are in violation. If they are not listed below, they DO NOT have a Town issued license, please alert SPD by calling (812)246-4491.

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Prather St. at US-31 will be closed Wednesday morning (6/12/24) from approximately 4am through 8am for asphalt spot repairs along the seam where it meets US-31.

During this time, please use Allhands Ave. to Highland Ave. to access US-31.

As always, please use caution around our worker as you drive this area.

Thank you in advance for your patience and understanding as we work in that area.

Click here for an expanded view of the map.

6/10/24: An update regarding the status of Speed Park.

There have been questions about it becoming a Town Park, how, and why not.

It is important to first understand the State of Indiana Annexation laws that can be found in the Indiana State Code by visiting this link to the Indiana General Assembly under 36-4-3.

Annexation:

Speed Park by itself cannot be annexed into the Town because it does not meet the contiguous requirements as outlined in statute.

To be annexed into the Town, approximately 70 parcels would need to be forcibly annexed. The annexation laws have changed several times since the mid 2010s to favor property owners making forced annexation extremely difficult and, in many cases, impossible. This is why cases of forced annexation by municipalities are virtually nonexistent compared to the time frame from the early 2000s until the mid 2010s.

Voluntary annexation is possible if the required percentage of property owners were to petition the Town with voluntary annexation following state statute. Even if that were to happen, that doesn’t mean the park automatically becomes a Town Park as it’s still privately owned property. The town would still have to purchase the property. Another example of this is the Silver Creek Township Park. A small part of this is within the Town Limits, but a majority is outside of Town Limits. For the part that is in Town Limits, it is privately owned and maintained by the Township Trustee, Billy Ramser.

Land Acquisition by the Town:

Municipalities can only offer the average of 2 appraisals for land acquisition. The current property owners asking price is more than what preliminary estimated appraised value is. This conversation was had with the owner when they originally put it up for sale. We asked and encouraged donation or discount. Their response was “we want the cash”. We’ve spoken to the county regarding them owning it, they do not have nor have interest in starting a parks department for the sole purpose of owning Speed Park.

Several conversations were had with philanthropist and foundations. Some had interest in contributing but none had interest in owning, maintaining, and carrying liability of the property forever. This has been the challenge from the beginning as to who, with the current make up of ownership and municipal boundaries, can actually own it if not privately held.

The town cannot spend property tax dollars in perpetuity to own and maintain property outside the town border. This would be like Town of Sellersburg owning a park in a Town of Clarksville neighborhood like Eagle Ridge of a City of Jeffersonville neighborhood like Indian Springs. While both have Sellersburg addresses, neither are within the Town of Sellersburg limits.

Purchase by Private Entity:

If it does sell, currently, nothing can be built on it due to sewer service collection system capacity issues within that developed area. As part of the county’s petition for rezoning, a letter of utility commitment from the sanitary sewer utility is needed. Due to the system capacity issues within that area, the Town cannot provide a letter of utility service for sewers at this time. The only option for sewer would be a septic system that would need testing and approval from the Clark County Health Department.

Options:

At this time, the best way for this private park to be saved is lobby the county to start a parks department (as it is within the county) or a grass roots effort from by the impacted County Residents in the area around the park to petition the Town Council for voluntary annexation by following the Indiana State Code referenced above.

If you have further questions, please reach out to Town Hall at (812)246-3821.

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2/1/24: It has come to our attention Speed Park has been officially put up for sale. Since 2022, many discussions were held. Unfortunately, there were no able partied entities who were willing to own, maintain, and accept liability for the park. In 2023, Silver Creek School Corp. did make an offer to the owner however, that deal fell through.

While the Town cannot own the park due to being well outside of our municipal limits, the Town does provide sewer services to that area. Currently, there is not capacity within our sewer collections system for that area to add additional users. This includes the entirety of the property known as Speed Park.

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8/8/22: As many have heard, Lehigh Hanson Aggregates (locally known as Essroc in Speed) will be moving most of their operations to Mitchell, Indiana. As part of this relocation, they are working internally to sell some of their local landholdings. We have been told by representatives of Lehigh Hanson that Speed Park and Speed Golf Course are NOT part of the “to be sold” conversations.

The Town has been in conversations with Lehigh Hanson regarding the future of Speed Park. To dispel any rumors, the Park has NOT been sold and will not be apartments, townhomes, houses, business, etc. Lehigh Hanson has committed to the Town they have no plans to sell it to developers and is interested in working with the Town to find a solution to ensure Speed Park remains a park for future generations to enjoy.

The challenge the Town now faces is that Speed Park is not located within the Town Limits of the Town of Sellersburg nor is there a way to annex it into the Town due to its distance from our municipal border. Speed Park, like the Speed community, falls within unincorporated Clark County. While the Town is interested in and has been working with Lehigh Hanson to preserve Speed Park, the Town of Sellersburg cannot own the park within our parks system due to being outside our limits.

Clark County Government does not currently have a Parks Department nor own any property that is classified as parks and recreations. However, the Town is working with the County and the Silver Creek Township Trustee on ideas centered around who could own the Park and how/who could/would maintain it.

The Sellersburg Town Council places great importance on the preservation of Speed Park. While outside of our Town limits, everyone agrees Speed Park is a Sellersburg Community Asset that is worth saving. The Town Manager at the direction of the Council will continue to work with Lehigh Hanson and our community partners until a solution is found that results in the long-term preservation of Speed Park.

Christmas Schedule:

Town offices will be closed Friday, December 22nd and Monday December 25th for the Christmas Holiday.

Friday’s trash collection will be on Thursday, December 21st. Monday’s trash collection will be on Tuesday, December 26th.

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New Year’s Schedule:

Town offices will be closed Monday, January 1st for the New Year’s Holiday.

Monday’s trash collection will be on Tuesday, January 2nd.

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After-Hours Emergency Contact Information:

If you experience a water or sewer emergency during this time, please call (812)246-3821 ext. 5 to reach the on-call utility team.

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Clark County Recycling District:

For information related to holiday recycling collection, please visit (recycleclarkcounty.org)

5:35pm 5/23/24 Update: The precautionary boil water advisory that was issued on 5/22/24 for your address is now lifted. Third-party testing results confirmed no foreign bacteria or contamination in the water supply. If you have not already, it is recommended that you flush your cold-water faucets for several minutes to help bleed air out of your system. Thank you.9:15pm 5/22/24 Update: Water service is now being restored. Those impacted should flush your cold water taps for a few minutes to clear air out of the lines. You will also be on a 48hr boil advisory pending results from a 3rd party lab.

In the afternoon of 5/22/24, an un-permitted boring company doing work for a communications company, hit the water main located on Wildwood Drive in the Creston Neighborhood.

At approximately 5:30pm, crews were able to isolate the impacted area to the following addresses:

• On Wildwood Drive: 606, 610, 611, 616, 617, 620, 629, 630
• All addresses on Fulton Street
• All addressed on N. Norman Drive
• On Edgewood Drive: 602

If you are in the impacted area, your service is currently interrupted. This outage impacts approximately 35 customers. Once the repair is complete and service is restored, your address will be on a precautionary 48 Hour Precautionary Boil Water Advisory pending testing results from a 3^rd party testing laboratory.

Anticipated time of repair completion: Approximately 10:00pm 5/22/24 or before.

If you have questions, please call 812.246.3821 extension 5 to contact our 24 Hour On-Call Technician.

Once the Precautionary Boil Advisory is lifted, you will be notified directly by a representative of Sellersburg Water.

On September 15, 2022 INDOT hosted a public information meeting regarding the upcoming US-31 Project that was originally scheduled to begin in summer of 2023.

Due to ongoing design challenges, INDOT pushed back the start of this project until Spring of 2025. The letting date for bid for this INDOT Project is July of 2024. Plan to see some construction work related to utility relocations begin in late summer of 2024.

For those wishing to know more about the project, all information can be found at this link:

You can also stop by Town Hall to view large maps of the project posted in the hallway.

If you have additional questions regarding this project, please visit INDOT4U.com

4/25/24 8:30pm UPDATE: The precautionary boil advisory related to this post is no longer in effect.

4/25/24 1:00am UPDATE: Service to the impacted area was restored at approximately 12:30am on 4/25/24. As noted below, those within the impacted area will be on a 48hr Boil Advisory as outlined below.

4/24/24: At approximately 7:30pm, Sellersburg Water was notified of a potential water main break at 8098 S. Indiana Ave. (US-31) in front of the Sellersburg Moose Lodge.

Shortly before 8pm, crews were able to isolate the break using newly installed valves within the system. The area of isolation includes the Sellersburg Moose Lodge, all businesses at the Silver Creek Logistics Center, those located on Bringham Dr., Industrial Blvd. and Progress Way, as well as households between 1006 S. Indiana Ave. and 1020 S. Indiana Ave. This isolation will impact approximately 17 households and 22 businesses.

All impacted customers have been notified via email and texts on file in our billing system. If you have not received notification via email and/or text from Sellersburg Water regarding this break, you are asked to contact the Billing Office at (812)246-3821 during normal business hours to verify your contact information on file to receive emergency notifications directly from Sellersburg Water.

*Yellow shaded area shows the impacted service area*

Once water service is restored, customers in the impacted area will be on a 48-hour precautionary boil water advisory pending testing results from a 3rd party testing laboratory. However, precautionary boil advisories usually last from 18 to 24 hours and customers will be notified in the same manner when the advisory has been lifted.

Customers should flush their cold water taps for a few minutes once service is restored to bleed air from their lines.

Once the boil water advisory is lifted, notification will be published on this website, the Town’s Facebook, news media, and customers will be contacted directly using the information on file in our billing department.

During the time of isolation for the repair, surrounding users may experience a drop in water pressure due to the rerouting of water flow within the system. Pressure to these areas will return once repairs have been completed.

Attention Sellersburg Water Customers:

Over the next couple of weeks, Sellersburg Water Crews will be working throughout the water system doing targeted hydrant flushing. The plan is to start working through the Jeffersonville service area the week of 4/15/24 and onto the Sellersburg service area the week of 4/22/24. This will not be a complete flush of the system, instead flushing non-looped, or “dead-end” areas of the system. “Dead-end” areas of the water system where they do not have continuous flows resulting in mineral build up within the water main. Flushing these dead-end areas will ensure proper water quality supplied to these areas.

As part of regular maintenance of the water distribution system, Sellersburg Water flushes the watermains using the fire hydrant system. This is an essential part of our system maintenance program. Although a regular part of our water distribution system, we do receive questions from time to time about why we flush. Because hydrant flushing is an important benefit, we’d like to tell you about it.

WHY FLUSHING IS IMPORTANT

Flushing our system helps to clean out any buildup of mineral deposits and sediment inside the pipes. These deposits can occur when there is a reduced water demand. We also flush our hydrants to confirm they are operational and to check fire flows in our system.

HOW WE FLUSH OUR PIPELINES

Flushing involves simultaneously opening fire hydrants in a specific area to create increased water flows. When our crews are on your street or nearby, this process usually takes about one hour.

WHAT TO EXPECT

When crews are in your area, you may notice a drop in water pressure or discolored water. Discolored water may occur, because the sediment in water mains get stirred up when the fire hydrants are used and when the flow of water in mains is changed. This is normal. If this happens, it is not harmful. Simply let your water run until it is clear.

WHAT TO DO TO PREPARE FOR FLUSHING

• Draw water for cooking ahead of time.
• Store a large bottle of water in the refrigerator for drinking.
• Check for discolored water before using the washing machine or dishwasher.

ADDITIONAL CUSTOMER TIPS

• Avoid running your tap water and using the washing machine or dishwasher while crews are flushing in your area.
• If discolored water occurs, simply run the cold water for a few minutes until it clear. This will allow the sediment to work its way through your pipes.
• Check for discolored water before using the washing machine or dishwasher. Wait until the water runs clear at the tap before doing laundry or running the dishwasher. NOTE: If your laundry becomes stained, DO NOT PUT YOUR LAUNDRY IN THE DRYER. Rewash clothes immediately using detergent and add a rust remover. Most rust removers can also be used on stained fixtures.

In some cases, slight discoloration might linger for a few hours. This discoloration only affects the appearance of the water and does not affect water quality. No health hazards are associated with discolored water from hydrant flushing. If water pressure or water volume seems low after flushing has been completed, check your faucet screens for trapped particles.

If you have additional questions, please contact the Sellersburg Billing Office at (812)246-3821 ext 1.