HB 10-21-2021

Page 2 — Thursday, October 21, 2021 — The Hastings Banner

The school will use money from a millage

passed in 2019 to pay for the new building.

Funds from the millage have already been

used to make other facility upgrades in the

district, including other sections of the ele-

mentary building.

Corlett said the district has needed to

replace the building for several years, due to

the high cost of maintenance of issues such as

flooding in the basement and a leaking roof.

In other business:

• Corlett said the district has seen a slight
  increase in COVID-19 cases.
  “We haven’t had a single outbreak yet, so
  I’m incredibly thankful,” he said. “Our par-
  ents are doing a good job keeping sick kids
  home and getting them tested.”

He noted the district recently sent a survey

to parents, asking them to rate the district’s

performance on certain issues. He said the

district’s highest rating was in safety.

• The district received a pallet of donations
  from Amazon, including laptops, tablets and
  miscellaneous items such as laundry soap.
  Corlett said some items will be used by the
  district, others will be given away as prizes at
  parent events, and some will be donated to
  residents in need.


• The board unanimously approved the
  hiring of Katelyn Thompson as substitute
  teacher; Jennifer Sinclair as high school sec-
  retary; Natasha DeYoung as middle school
  special education paraprofessional; Emily
  Richie as DK Panther Clubhouse Day Care

Supervisor; Valerie Manwarren as DK

Panther Clubhouse Daycare Assistant; and

Lorie Nierman as elementary online teacher.

• During public comment, two people
  thanked Corlett for his attendance at the meet-
  ing of the Barry County Board of Commissioners
  last month, where Corlett stated the belief that
  mask mandates were unnecessary.
  One woman criticized the district’s COVID
  quarantine policy.


• Monday’s meeting was at the high school
  auditorium due to high attendance at previous
  meetings. But Corlett said meetings will
  move back to the elementary school library
  next month.
  That meeting will begin at 7 p.m. Monday,
  Nov. 15.

passed and Mole finally showed her the

image. It fit with what she was looking for.

“I said I didn’t want anything offensive. I

didn’t want anything political,” she said. “I

wanted something that would make people

think and talk. And Mole did the rest.”

But first, they had to get permission from

the building owner, Tom Kramer.

After seeing the initial image, it took 24

hours for Kramer to come around to the idea.

“It was something that I didn’t anticipate,

but once I looked at it, I thought it was a pret-

ty awesome thing,” Kramer said. “So, it

didn’t take long before it really grew on me.”

They also needed funding – $16,000 worth.

When Mole started in September, they only

had $2,000.

The Thornapple Arts Council doesn’t nor-

mally start projects without funding, Lavell

said. But she pitched the project to the board,

and they gave the go-ahead.

“I believed in the project enough that I got

my board to sign on and say, ‘Yeah, we can

do this, even if we don’t raise the full amount,

we can put some cash into this,’” she said.

It didn’t take long for the money to come

together. Lavell collected donations from

private donors and the Barry Community

Foundation. But they were still $2,000 short.

That coincided with the formation of a new

local philanthropic group, Guys That Give,

an organization designed after the Women’s

Giving Circle of Barry County. The group,

which will meet quarterly, plans to raise

money for projects in the community.

On September 9, eight men met for the

first time at Waldorff to discuss the formation

of the group and projects that might interest

them. As they talked, co-founder Chelsey

Foster looked out the window at Tom

Kramer’s brick wall. He knew about the

mural project, but it hadn’t started yet. He

turned to the seven other men at the table.

What about funding the new mural?

By the end of the meeting, the group had

the $2,000 committed from 14 different peo-

ple, and the project was fully funded.

“It just adds a new dimension to our down-

town and just yet another example showing,

in a big way, that Barry County and Hastings

support the arts,” Foster said.

Everyone involved with the project said

they have heard very little negative feedback

from community members. If anything, they’ve

received widespread positive feedback.

For Lavell, the response just underlines the

need for public art in Hastings.

“Art is part of a healthy community,” she

said. “It’s part of a well-rounded community.

If you think about communities that you

want to go to, that you want to spend your

time, that you want to vacation in – arts and

culture are a primary driver of those things.

So if you think about how important that is

for tourism dollars, it is equally important for

people who live there.”

Now, Mole is in the final stages of the proj-

ect, with about three weeks left.

Mole started the mural on Sept. 14. He

takes a picture of the mural every day at noon

to mark his progress.

“Every dry daylight hour for the last [38]

days, I’ve been out there,” he said.

Although it may look like a general outline

of the United States, the project has required

careful attention to detail. He used a sort of

gridding system, matching each part of the

drawing with a brick to make sure it accurate-

ly portrayed the United States map.

“Basically, just copy it, millimeter by mil-

limeter, brick by brick,” he said.

But it’s not meant to be an exact represen-

tation of the United States.

“Every map ... gets copied and copied and

copied and copied and things get stylized a

little bit,” he said.

After spraying the inside of the U.S. white

and the outside black, Mole has spent weeks

focusing on the intricacies of the coastlines. It

has required more detail than he originally

had anticipated. He has exhausted days

perched up in the lift, painting the crevices

and juts of Lake Michigan, for example.

“[The mural’s] pretty crude,” he said. “...

The more detail I put into the coastline, the

more delicate it starts to look, which is curi-

ous. It is delicate, like the coastline is deli-

cate, and that portrait of Florida is probably

going to look like that longer than Florida

looks like that.”

Still, the mural is missing a few important

parts. The final pieces, Kramer said, will

bring the project together.

“There’s going to be so little more,” he

added, “yet once he’s finished it’s going to

be, it’s going to complete the project.”

But Mole won’t reveal any details. Only a

handful of people have seen the final draw-

ings, and he doesn’t plan to show anyone else

until it’s finished.

“You’re going to have to wait and see,” he

said.

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Missing teen found

dead, suspect charged

Patrick Hunter Gilmore, 17, of Hastings,

was charged last Thursday with murder and

concealing the death of Lane Roslund, 17, of

Hastings.

Gilmore was arraigned in Barry County

District Court on one count of open murder, a

felony punishable by up to life in prison, and

concealing the death of an individual, a felo-

ny punishable by up to five years in prison.

Police had been seeking Roslund since

family members reported Sept. 21 that they

hadn’t heard from him for about two weeks.

They discovered the body of a male, believed

to be Roslund, on Wednesday, Oct. 13. Then

Oct. 15, Michigan State Police confirmed the

identity of the decedent as Roslund.

Gilmore was charged as an adult by auto-

matic waiver. Bond was set at $750,000 cash

or surety. His probable cause conference was

set for 9 a.m. Oct. 27 before Judge Michael

Schipper.

Prosecutor Julie Nakfoor Pratt said a photo of

Gilmore has not yet been released due to his age

and recent changes in the law regarding minors.

Audit finds no issues,

Hastings schools to propose

bond in May 2022

Benjamin Simon

Staff Writer

Hastings Area School System will move

forward with a May 2022 bond proposal,

the board of education announced at its

meeting Monday.

The bond would cover the same scope of

the August 2021 proposal, which included

fixing the 20-year-old high school roof;

replacing windows, doors, desks and buses;

improving playground equipment; revamp-

ing bathrooms; renovating high school

locker rooms that date back to 1970; and

installing an air-purification system.

Superintendent Matt Goebel and Assistant

Superintendent of Operations Tim Berlin

will take the next steps by meeting with the

state treasury department in December to

finalize details for the bond proposal.

The news comes after an audit of the

2020-21 budget and 2015 bond found no

signs of money mismanagement in the

district.

The audit report was presented by Maner

Costerisan Manager Jonathan Ringlein at

the Oct. 18 meeting, where he provided the

district with an “unmodified opinion,”

which Ringlein said is the highest opinion

they can give.

The audit concluded that the district

received $27.5 million in revenues during

the 2020-21 fiscal year, more than $4 mil-

lion higher than it had initially budgeted for.

A large portion of the increase came from

$1.4 million in federal funding due to pan-

demic-related relief. The district finished

with a fund balance of $3.8 million, up from

$2.4 million at the beginning of the year.

“As I look around the room,” Trustee

Dan Patton said during the meeting, “I see

only a few faces that were here 10 years

ago, maybe 11 years ago, when this district

was over $600,000 in the hole.... At that

time, I told a lot of people we will never be

back there. And I’m glad to see that we’re

definitely in a direction where we will never

be back there.”

The budget is audited every year, and

Ringlein, who has audited the district for at

least three years, has yet to find any red

flags.

Bonds, however, are not reviewed every

year. An audit of the bond money begins

after 95 percent of the funds are used.

Maner Costerisan analyzed 80 to 85 percent

of the $43.6 million in bond expenditures,

Ringlein noted.

In the lead-up to the failed 2021 bond

proposal, many residents expressed concern

over how previous bond dollars were used.

But Ringlein confirmed that the district

did not spend money outside of its proposed

projects. That included major projects, such

as the construction of the middle school, the

building of the performing arts center at the

high school and the implementation of

security upgrades.

“From 2015-16 on, we have not noted

anything that was spent out of allowable

within the bond, and nothing that was spent

on anything other than what the voters voted

on,” Ringlein said during the meeting.

Although they don’t look at every trans-

action, Ringlein clarified that audits require

a thorough investigation of the district’s

finances and take around 100 to 150 hours

to conduct.

“We’re not just charging the district $20,

$25 grand just to slap an opinion on a piece

of paper,” he said. “We’re doing well-docu-

mented work to look at all these items.

“... We do have a sense of skepticism.

We don’t just trust anything management

says. So, we definitely get our third-party

confirmations, which is a big piece of

what we do.”

In an interview after the meeting, Goebel

expressed enthusiasm following the audit,

calling it an “A-plus rating.”

“We’re really excited about a fantastic

audit again this year,” Goebel said, “an

unbelievably clean audit that came through.

And, obviously, financially, our central

office team puts a lot of work into an audit

like that and making sure that all of our

taxpayer dollars are spent accordingly.”

Board of Education President Luke

Haywood praised the financial standing of

the district, pointing to the district’s one-

time federal funds as a major help.

But the district, he said, still has major

maintenance demands that require a bond.

“We have a lot of great needs in the dis-

trict – roofs, doors, windows,” he said

during the meeting. “... That’s why we

thought as a finance committee to bring this

[bond] forward again. Those needs don’t go

away. And our district is not in a financial

position to take care of all those needs.”

In other business, the board:

• Approved a bid from Buist Automation
  of $270,823 for new security cameras and
  cabling in the district’s six buildings. It
  marks the end of funds from the 2015 bond.


• Purchased a white 2015 Ford Transit
  handicap-accessible van from Broadmoor
  Motors for $26,245 to assist with wheel-
  chair transportation.


• Accepted two donations for library
  books at Northeastern Elementary School:
  $1,000 from Tom Kramer, and $300 from
  Ted and Kathryn Robbins.


• Accepted a $500 donation from an
  anonymous donor to be split between two
  Northeastern Elementary School teachers
  for their classrooms.


• Accepted $1,455 worth of school sup-
  plies from Walmart.


• Accepted the personnel report which
  included the retirement of Judy Way, mid-
  dle school social studies teacher; the
  appointment of Amanda Beadle, Ashley
  Morgan and Ashley VanBelkum, substitute
  paraprofessionals; Michelle Hineman, sub-
  stitute bus driver; Courtney Kloosterhouse,
  virtual special education teacher at the high
  school; Jeffrey Mansfield, career and tech-
  nical education paraprofessional; the trans-
  fers of Jennifer DeZwaan and Brenda
  Johncock, healthcare I paraprofessionals, to
  Star Elementary; and the resignations of
  Kami Collier, instructional assistant at
  Northeastern Elementary, and Dawn
  Goodman, bus driver.

Lane Roslund, 17, of Hastings, was

reported missing Sept. 21.

ARTIST, continued

from page 1 ––––––––––

announced a partnership to share their exper-

tise in food processing innovation.

The MSU Product Center will expand out-

reach efforts by managing the FARM food

processing accelerator that was developed by

the association.

That facility in Muskegon will provide

space and technical assistance to entrepre-

neurs and businesses to scale up new product

and service ideas into the food, agriculture

and bioenergy markets, according to a joint

announcement.

AgFunder’s 2021 Agrifoodtech Investment

Report ranked Michigan third among the top

states for its investment in this sector of the

economy, because of its cold-chain logistics,

automation software and innovations from

streamlining production agriculture to re-envi-

sioning convenient, healthy local food supply.

Organizations in the region individually

excel in food, agriculture, research, manufac-

turing and business sectors, Kuhn noted, but

there is a need for a comprehensive approach

to using regional and statewide expertise to

maximize the growth potential.

Federal support through a regional chal-

lenge grant “would enable the region to

increase capacity and create more access to

resources,” she pointed out. “This, in turn,

will aid in strengthening the regional food

system, and equip the workforce of the

future, based on science and data-driven pro-

tocol, ultimately increasing economic, envi-

ronmental and social impacts to the West

Michigan region’s food sector.”

As Bee put it simply, “We make it locally

to get the benefit locally.”

One aspect to the project that could be

considered for Barry County, he mentioned,

would be to improve cold storage here.

In her list of project ideas, Kuhn mentioned

that Barry County is currently conducting a

feasibility study on cold storage capacity.

The initiative envisions high-tech, highly

paid jobs in the food sector.

With increased capacity and access to

resources, the regional food system would be

strengthened and equip the workforce of the

future, she wrote.

“The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic severely

disrupted the global food supply chain, leaving

food companies and other supply chain partici-

pants to begin redirect work with regional net-

works and logistics,” Kuhn said. “In many sit-

uations, regional players ultimately provided

the solution in delivering food to retail, schools

and food banks, as the state and country contin-

ued to redirect the flow of food. ...

“As the flow of food redirected from insti-

tutions, restaurants and like venues, food

companies were forced to repackage huge

quantities of food suitable for retail, creating

opportunity for MSU’s expertise in packag-

ing and new AgTech companies with innova-

tive solutions, to become a higher demand

need for the food industry.”

The crisis forced food companies to

explore and implement solutions so that oper-

ations become more effective and efficient on

the plant floor.

“Strengthening regional networks and sup-

ply chains through the work of WMFPA and

other partners will ensure resiliency in the

supply chain for the future,” she noted.

Kuhn suggested a variety of project ideas

that could be funded by the federal grant

money, including:

• Capacity building for the WMFPA region-
  al network and supply chain logistics.


• Technical assistance and training in new
  technologies addressing current needs of the
  food industry related to reducing food waste in
  landfills, sustainable packaging, energy-effi-
  cient build-outs and minimally processed foods.


• Workforce development efforts to fill
  labor and skills gaps in agricultural produc-
  tion and food manufacturing through partner-
  ships with MSU Institute of Agricultural
  Technology, local community colleges and
  state workforce development agencies.


• Increasing programming opportunities
  for the FARM center.


• A mobile food processing unit and equip-
  ment.


• A regional analysis of water infrastruc-
  ture, including drinking water and wastewa-
  ter treatment capacity to serve the food sector
  and potential construction projects related to
  capacity needs.

FOOD, continued from page 1 –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

DELTON, continued from page 1 –––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––––

J. Maizlish Mole works on the coastline of Texas mid afternoon on Oct. 18. Mole

moved to Hastings from London last year.