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POSEY WRESTLERS EXCEL Inside This Week: Opinion ................A2 Obits .................... A3 Retro ....................A4
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Church .................A5 Bus Dir .................A8 Jump ....................A9
C. Calendar ...... A10 Sports ............B1, B2 Court News .... B3, B8
Legals .............B3, B8 PCSWCD ........ B4-5 Classifieds............B9
SINCE 1882 Successor to The Poseyville News & New Harmony Times
P C N $1.00
Tuesday, February 2, 2021
Volume 141 Edition 5
U W 2020 A W
To date the campaign has reached 97.1 percent of the $550,000 goal for the year. The campaign will close on February 15 so there is still time to help make the goal.
Tonya McDaniel (right) received the Industry/ Joe Crissup. Joe was recognized for Business Campaign Volunteer Award and Brittany Chris Spurgeon was recognized for beDan Ritter received the United Way being the 2020 United Way President. ing the 2020 United Way Campaign Chair. 2020 Volunteer of the Year award. Griggs (left) the Agency Campaign Volunteer Award.
Goedde replaces Fitts as head nurse at Posey Health Dept. By Lois Mittino Gray Kelli Goedde is the new Posey County Health Nurse and she knows that the position comes with many challenges in these COVID crisis days. Her hire was formally announced on the Posey County Health Department’s Facebook page on January 22. She is taking over for Martye Fitts, RN, who left the position the day before the announcement. Goedde started at the Health Department office at the beginning of January to work in a part-time position. “I was out of the nursing field for six years staying home, so I decided to ease back into it part-time when
PC Health Nurse Kelli Goedde
my youngest started driving. I worked three whole days and Chief County Health Officer Dr. Kyle Rapp offered me the full-time position, since Martye just resigned. It all happened that fast.” Kelli brings an eclectic mix of experience to the job with her twenty-five plus years of nursing. After she was graduated from Reitz High School in 1989, she decided to follow her dream to become a nurse by attending the program at the University of Southern Indiana for two years. From there, she concentrated on nursing education classes at Ivy Tech Community College. After completion and gradua-
tion in 1994, she passed her nursing boards and was a certified registered nurse ready to go. “I’ve held multiple positions in many areas in nursing,” she said. “I started at Deaconess Hospital working in the med-surg unit. I did home health care and then worked with a physician specializing in pain management for six years. I helped in my husband’s law office doing medicalrelated record administration, such as social security disability, too.” Then, the six year hiatus came until the present time. In her new role, Nurse Goedde administered vaccines at the Poseyville
COVID Clinic this past Wednesday at Saint Paul’s Church. Ten percent of the county’s vaccines will go to this clinic held on Wednesdays, as long as vaccine supplies are available. The remaining ninety percent allotted to the county will be administered through a contract the county arranged with the Deaconess Hospital Express in Mount Vernon. Interested persons may check for eligibility for vaccinations at the sites through ourshot. in.gov. She also does the COVID dashboard reports for the county, releasing
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Crows make annual return By Lois Mittino Gray They’re baaack, and just as much of a nuisance as ever. It’s estimated that around 50,000 of those pesky, messy, noisy crows are frequenting the downtown areas and riverfront of Mount Vernon these days. Trying to control their numbers was discussed once again under Old Business at the January 28, Mount Vernon Board of Public Works Zoom meeting. Mount Vernon Mayor Bill Curtis asked for a current update on the problem from Utilities Superintendent Chuck Gray. Gray replied emphatically, “There are lots of crows. Southwind port fires propane cannons at them late at night which drives them over to the city. Right now, they are probably sitting at the riverfront and roosting on the courthouse and making a mess in our historic areas. I’ve tried so many things. I fire cannons and noise at them, too, at different times. I’m just stumped what to do.” Board member David Dodd questioned trying a concerted effort. “Could we coordinate with local industry, like the port, and do the same routine at the same time?” he queried. Gray replied, “In the past, that just drives them farther into town. They have no natural predators. There is grain lying around and open garbage cans. These birds aren’t going anywhere. They stay around my defenses and get used to them” After much discussion on trapping, poisoning, and hunting as possibilities, the Mayor said that the city has tried several things over the
years, nothing seems to work, and he is out of new ideas. Poisoning was ruled out as the poison is not species-specific and would poison cats and dogs, songbirds and other animals. Also the poison is not fast-acting and the birds flap and thrash around on the ground before death. It was agreed townspeople don’t like to see that. City Attorney Beth Higgins asked if the street department has noticed more trash cans not being covered on the trash routes. Street Commissioner Max Dieterle replied workers have not noticed an increase, but did note that if the cans are put out one or two days ahead of pickup, the birds will get in to them. Curtis suggested a public service announcement in the newspaper and on social media sites about keeping lids on trash cans to help eliminate the crow problem. In conclusion to the crow discussion, Gray stated the best way to alleviate the problem is to shoot them and let them lie on the ground, which deters the other birds who see them, but this would garner a negative public reaction. The crow calendar officially lists the season as December 3 to March 3, but Gray said the clever corvids usually arrive here in late October and leave by the end of February. “We’ve put up with this for years. We’ll just have to put up with them until they leave. It is an inconvenience, but we have exhausted the subject. It North Posey High School seniors Tori Crawford, Remi Adams, and Kennedy Devine will seems nature always wins,” the Mayor declared. vy for the title of basketball homecoming queen on Friday, February 12. Seniors Gaige Kihn, Nicholas Stump, and Garrett Parker are king candidates. Underclass attendant pictures will Continued on Page A9 appear in next week’s issue. Photo submitted
Shelby says ‘so long’ to North Posey schools SWAT team one of highlights of 35 years on the job
Jeanella Shelby
(USPS 439-500)
By Lois Mittino Gray Jeanella Shelby smiles when she says she had her own SWAT team at North Elementary School in Poseyville. In her new role as the School Technology Coordinator in 1998, she formed a Students with Advanced Technology (SWAT) club. “It had as many as 75 students who learned how to take computers apart, how to clean them, and helped me all over school with tech support. It was all so new then. They were such good kids. I am still in contact with many of them,” she remarked. Jeanella retired at the end of last semester after 35 years working in the North Posey School District, most of those working the ‘frontline’ of computer technology. She retired from the position of Technology Coordinator at the Junior High-High School which she accepted in 2013.
Jeanella’s last day of work was celebrated on December 18 with a cake, a decorated office, and well-wishers coming by the office all day to congratulate her and say goodbye. They laughed over lessons learned, like dogs, rabbits and pigs eat Chromebook chargers and reminisced about computers in the old days. “Do you remember how slow those old Commodore 64 computers were? In 1998, we started with those Commodore 64 computers in our labs. A whole class came in a couple times a week. It’s all we had,” she recalled. “Now all of our students are one to one with a Chromebook of their own to take home and have Internet use. It’s so different now.” Jeanella traveled far in those years, going from early days as a Prime-Time teacher aide to high school computer
technology. She started at North Elementary School in the Prime-Time program as an aide in the third grade in a class of 31 students. Prime Time was developed to help lighten the load in larger classes, but eventually the program was discontinued. She transferred over to working in special education, until she became the Technology Coordinator at the North school in 1998. Computers were new and daunting, but challenging. Starting out, she attended many training sessions and learned on her own through experience. “If we couldn’t repair it, we often replaced it,” Jeanella observed. Besides computer development progress, she has seen transition from using chalkboards to Active Boards, New Line Boards and Smart TV’s. Teachers have many tools of all types at hand to use for instruction.
“Now computers are a continuous part of the classroom. Having a Chromebook helps students learn skills they will need after graduation in the working world. It totally prepares them. They learn to work virtually on lessons and projects, we don’t even need to lose time on snow days anymore,” she mused. Jeanella resides in Griffin with Bill, her husband of 48 years. The couple met as Rappites at New Harmony High School, Class of ‘71 and ‘72, respectively. They met in study hall and dated all through high school, attending proms and dances and sporting events together. Their daughter, Christina, attended North Posey High School and still lives nearby in the area. In her retirement, Jeanella has many
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