Bar-restaurant great idea for saving 100-year-old school building



In response to the letter: “Does Terre Haute yet need one more huge bar?” The question should be: “Does Terre Haute need to demolish one more beautiful historic building?”

I had driven by this building for many years while I lived only a few blocks away. I always thought this attractive old school house had potential and hoped that someone would find a use for it. Unfortunately, it has remained empty for several years and interested previous buyers were considering demolition.

After taking a closer look, you don’t see this type of construction today. Inside the school house, patrons and former graduates of W.O. Weldelle School can continue to enjoy most of the building’s original floor plan that features wood floors, brick walls, wood stair rails, original wood doors with original glass valances and some chalk boards that are still in place. We will continue to remodel the exterior with new windows, doors, gutters and landscaping. The parking lot will meet all requirements of the city of Terre Haute. In addition, we plan to install privacy barriers between the property and the neighbors as well as work with the city to address any traffic concerns.

As far as the comment that this new business will be bad for the Heritage Trail, we believe it will be an asset. We will have accommodations for bicycle enthusiasts. Our location at North Fruitridge and Locust will be ideal for people to stop and get something to eat, drink and have access to clean rest rooms.

There are always early concerns with growth or change.

I appreciate the input from the previous writer. I’m always interested in hearing constructive criticism. Feedback gives me a chance to address unrecognized concerns, so I can meet my goals of creating a unique and successful business as well as being a good neighbor.

— Jim Nicoson

The owner of

the Old School

Terre Haute



Intrusive expansion of visitation litigation



Most Hoosiers have no idea that in Indiana, widowed, divorced and single parents can be sued for grandparent visitation. If such parents make the difficult decision that contact with a grandparent is bad for their child or even dangerous, a trial judge can overrule this decision. Now, bills are racing through the Indiana House and Senate that would undermine the parental authority of parents in intact families and subject them to the same litigation.

Grandparent visitation litigation is almost always a tragic and counterproductive mistake, with the child the principal victim. Litigation generally puts an end to any possibility of future improvement in relations between parent and grandparent. By so doing, it further reduces the chances of a healthy and beneficial relationship between grandparent and grandchild. If the grandparent wins visitation, the child will be in an ongoing emotional crossfire. The litigation itself places enormous emotional stress on the custodial family, and consumes financial resources that would otherwise have benefitted, even fed and clothed, the child at its center.

The proponents of these bills, HB 1055 and SB 59, express concern about grandparents and great-grandparents who step in to care for their grandchildren when the parents are unable to do so, only to be kept away from the children when the parents take up their role again. These concerns can be addressed through guardianship proceedings or statutes concerning de facto parenthood, or, where the parents are arguably unfit, via Child Protective Services. These bills reach far further.

The U.S. Supreme Court case of Troxel v. Granville, repeatedly recognized by the Indiana Court of Appeals, held that a parent’s fundamental constitutional right to raise his or her child includes the right to make decisions about contact between children and their grandparents (or other nonparents). Courts must, in any grandparent visitation dispute, start out by presuming that the parent’s decision to deny grandparent visitation was in the child’s best interests. Only if that presumption is decisively rebutted, by specific facts rather than generalizations about grandparental affection, may the court override the parent’s decision.

Our current grandparent visitation statute, I.C. 31-17-5, unfortunately makes no mention of these binding constitutional principles. The proposed bills not only would not correct this situation, but would greatly expand the scope of nonparent visitation litigation. Intact families who have not in any way involved the judicial system in their family lives could be thrust into the purgatory of visitation litigation.

The situations most often thought to require such intervention — where a single, divorced or widowed parent is unwilling to let the child continue a relationship with the parents of the noncustodial parent — would no longer be a prerequisite for a family’s being dragged into court.

Please — call or e-mail your state representative and senator immediately and tell them to oppose these bills. Contact Gov. Daniels and urge him to veto the bills if he receives them. Please do what you can to stop this well-intentioned, but harmful and intrusive expansion of nonparent visitation litigation.

— Karen A. Wyle, attorney

Bloomington



Soggy Donuts Fund had a great year



As 2009 has come and gone and we start 2010, I wanted to take a few minutes to reflect and say thank you to all of you who have helped make The Soggy Donuts Fund as successful as it’s become.

Last year, 2009, was a year of many events for the fund. The Pancake Breakfast at Applebee’s with our celebrity servers, the Spaghetti Dinner sponsored by Fazoli’s, The First Annual Golf Tournament held with our friends at Idle Creek Golf Course, the 50 inch Samsung TV raffle, Law Enforcement Day at Old National Bank, the Lambda Chi Alpha Classic Car Show at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology, and of course National Police Week in Washington D.C.

The Soggy Donuts Fund also helped sponsor the Guns Gunning for Gunner fundraiser at the local Fraternal Order of Police Lodge No. 85 where we raised upwards of $6,500 for a little boy born with Down’s Syndrome. Wow, is all I can say about that event. It was amazing.

With all of these events in mind and nearly all of them taking place right here in Terre Haute, community support has been second to none. Thank you, Terre Haute, and the surrounding communities.

In a time where people are struggling and the economy being horrible, The Soggy Donuts Fund has been truly blessed. People came out and bought T-shirts, dinners, breakfasts, TV raffle tickets, and supported a fund that was a start-up local fund and showed a lot of faith in everyone working with the fund. Again, a huge thank you. The men and woman who have helped with the fund by donating their time and efforts are the real reason that The Soggy Donuts Fund has been a success. They are the heart and soul of the fund and I think they all deserve a huge public thank you as well.

There have been so many I couldn’t even start to name them all here. I know I would forget someone and I don’t want to do that so I will just say thank you from the bottom of my heart. The officers who have received support/help thank you very much. They are appreciative in so many ways. We have reached out to help officers as far away as California, Kansas, and New York. We helped local victims of the flooding that changed so many of our lives back in 2008 right here in Terre Haute. If you know of any law enforcement officer who needs assistance please visit us at www.soggy

donuts.org and let us know.

Some organizations need to be thanked publicly and I want all of you to know the people who have helped. I believe in doing business with the people who give back to their community and the below businesses and people have done just that. Thank you all. I look forward to working with all of you In the future. It has been a pleasure.

First and foremost, IUPA local 133 and The Fraternal Order of Police Lodge 85 as well as the members of the Terre Haute Police Department and Terre Haute Fire Department have been fantastic. The members of Terre Haute Fire Fighters Local IAFF 758, Ace Sign and Awning, All IN Tavern, Baesler’s Market, B&B; Foods, Buffalo Wild Wings, Old National Bank, Terre Haute Tent and Awning, Ballyhoo Tavern, Booker T. Washington Center, Betty Lanke of ReMax Realty, Corepoint Hair Studio, Coca Cola, Curves for Women, Dever Distributing, Elder Beerman, Ellis Law Office, Fast Track Apparel, Gibault School, Harvey Construction, Honey Creek Mall, Kohl’s Department Store, Larry Paul Charitable Foundation, Martinsville Pharmacy, MacAllister Rental, Modesitt Law Office, Pharmacy Shoppe, Pepsi Cola Refreshment Services, Press Time Graphics, Terre Haute Regional Hospital, the Tribune-Star, WTWO, WTHI, Russ Fisher Truck Parts, SWAT Digest, Watrin Corp., Vigo County Prosecutor’s Office, Vigo County School Corp. and its staff, Wetnight RV and its staff, as well as Mayor Duke Bennett, the Honorable Mike Lewis, Dr. Michael Toney, Jerry and Paula Johnson, Ron Steiner, Matthew Newberry as well as Chris and Jennifer Wrede.

Again, I’m sure I have left an organization or a person out. It wasn’t intentional. I just again want to thank everyone who has helped or supported The Soggy Donuts Fund.

— Brad Newman

President/ Founder

The Soggy Donuts Fund

Terre Haute



Americans still in control of country



Up until Jan. 18, all seemed like it had been lost. The government was moving ahead with national health care, like it or not. Our politicians, as often happens under liberal leadership, thought that the American people were somehow unable to make informed decisions on matters that affected their own lives. We were made to look like inept pieces of the socialism puzzle that the Obama administration was trying to put together.

When the pieces of the puzzle didn’t fit nice and neat, the administration simply bent the corners (the special deal given to Nebraska for the support of their senator, Ben Nelson, on the issue of national health care) and pushed a little harder to ensure that each piece was in place.

To the average American citizen such as myself, it seemed like there was nothing more we could do. No matter how obvious it was that the American people were against this monstrosity of a bill, it was just as obvious that our government would do what they wanted to anyway. The old adage of one person can make a difference seemed like a distant memory of a country that we were leaving behind.

But then something funny happened. The calendar flipped to Jan. 19, the day of the special Senate election in Massachusetts. The Democratic candidate represented everything the current administration stood for — higher taxes, less individual control, bigger government and socialistic health care. The people of the United States were against her, but Barack Obama was giving speeches on her behalf. Obama wins, right?

Not so fast. The Republican candidate, Scott Brown, had something that the Democrats did not have; common sense. Scott Brown ran a campaign that focused on the things that Americans value. Individual responsibility, lower taxes, smaller government and a tough stance when it comes to terrorism highlighted Scott Brown’s agenda and struck a chord with Americans. Trailing Coakley by 30 points with a month to go, Scott Brown kept his nose to the grind and beat Coakley by five points in a state that had elected Ted Kennedy to the Senate for 46 years. Immediately after the election, the Democrats were jumping off of the national health care boat like it was a sinking ship.

If those same Democrats had listened to the American people in the first place, they would realize that the health care ship is already sitting on the bottom of the ocean. With the special election for one Senate seat, I realized something big. The American people were still alive. One person with common sense solutions can still make a difference.

With that being said, we must stay vigilant. The Obama administration will try to make it look like it is their idea to slow down national health care. They will try to fool us into believing that they have seen the light. We will know better though. Not because we are college professors or members of the media, not because we are multi-millionaire businessmen. We will know better because we are Americans, and when push comes to shove, we still control this country.

— Brandon Wright

Terre Haute