North Judson Establishes Redevelopment Commission

The Town of North Judson now has a redevelopment commission. It was officially established by the town council Monday.

The new redevelopment commission will open up a few opportunities for North Judson, according to Town Attorney Justin Schramm. “It allows us to identify property within the town that needs redevelopment,” he told council members. “It allows us to purchase, improve, and dispose of property, as long as it furthers the town’s redevelopment purposes, and that is very broad. Again, it’s a very positive thing that we have this. There’s a lot that we can do with this, and I just think it’s time that we establish this redevelopment commission.”

The commission will be made up of five voting members plus a member of the school board appointed as a non-voting member. Two of the voting members are appointed by the town council, while everyone else is appointed by the town council president.

In the end, all five council members were appointed as redevelopment commission members. The council’s appointed representative on the North Judson-San Pierre School Board, Jeri Brewer, was appointed as the school board’s representative on the commission.

Now that the redevelopment commission is in place, Schramm outlined its next steps to get up and running. “Over about the next 60 days, there’s several things that we will need to be doing as a redevelopment commission in order to identify property that needs redevelopment, have public hearings,” Schramm said.

Council members suspended the rules and passed the ordinance establishing the redevelopment commission and department of redevelopment on all three readings Monday.