The Lincoln Central Neighborhood Homebuyer’s Program is organizing a workshop for first-time homebuyers next month at Yes Cinema.

The workshop will be presented by Apprisen, in partnership with Fifth Third Bank, the Southern Indiana Housing and Community Development Corporation and Lincoln Central.

Workshop topics will include preparing for homeownership, working with a real estate agent and understanding budgets and credit history. After finishing the workshop, participants will receive a HUD homebuyer certificate of completion.

The workshop is free. It will be from  9 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 9th. Registration is required. For more information or to register, you can call the Lincoln-Central Neighborhood Family Center at 812-379-1630 or email [email protected].

YES Cinema is at 328 Jackson Street in downtown Columbus.

According to the Highway Department,
South Lane of E Base Road, between 300 East and Della Street, will be closed thru Friday from 7:30 am until 6 pm. Drive Slow and Please watch for a flagman or avoid the area if at all possible.

The Columbus Department of Public Works has announced that there will be no collection delay on Election Day November 5th. All collections will be running on time. Please remember to have your toters out by 7am.
The office will be closed on November 5th and will reopen at 7am on the 6th. For more information visit their website at www.columbus.in.gov/public-works.

A local charity that provides free shopping experiences for those living with dementia will be holding a fundraiser next month with a Golden Age of Hollywood theme.

Sandi’s Closet was founded in 2022 by Jill Tasker in honor of her mother, Sandi Hinshaw. As her mother’s Alzheimer’s Disease progressed taking her shopping in public became challenging and Tasker set up a small, in-home shopping experience. The effort now serves fifteen facilities in eight counties, including assisted living, memory care and adult day cares.

The “To Have and Have Another” fundraiser will be a glitzy cocktail party held from 5:30 to 7 on November 7th at Helen Haddad Hall on Franklin Street in Columbus.

{To become a sponsor for this event or to donate to this charity contact Jill Tasker at [email protected] or call 812-657-7480}

The deadline is approaching to sign up for the next series of job readiness workshops organized by Bartholomew County Works.

Bartholomew County Works is committed to helping members improve their lives, gain full-time employment and achieve economic self-sufficiency.

The next day-long workshop series will start on Monday November 4th and run through Friday November 8th at Yes Cinema.

An orientation session will be held Thursday, October 31st from 10 to 11:30 a.m. in the morning.

The deadline to sign up is Wednesday, October 30th.

To get more information on signing up, you can call Lincoln-Central Neighborhood Family Center at 812-378-2638.

Investigators with the Seymour Police Department arrested a North Carolina man for rape and sexual misconduct with a minor.

On October 18th investigators arrested Mark A. Ballinas ,of Clayton North Carolina for rape and sexual misconduct with a minor. Ballinas was taken to Jackson County Jail for processing.

After Ballinas was arrested, investigators, with the assistance of patrol officers, learned that Ballinas and his younger brother was attempting to obstruct the investigation.

On October 24th, patrol officers located the vehicle that the original incident occurred in as well as the younger brother of Ballinas. Investigators obtained a Search Warrant for the vehicle and collected evidence related to the crime.

Officials  attempted to interview the younger brother of Ballinas, Joustin,  but he was uncooperative. Investigators arrested Joustin David Ballinas-Ramirez of Seymour, for two counts of obstruction. Ballinas-Ramirez was taken to the Jackson County Jail for processing. Mark Ballinas was still incarcerated from his earlier arrest and was additionally charged with obstruction.

Columbus City Utilities has announced that they will be closed on Election Day November 5th, resuming regular business hours on Wednesday November 6th at 7AM. Additionally, they will also be closed on Veteran’s Day Monday November 11th. Regular Business hours will resume on Tuesday November 12th at 7AM. If you have a problem with your water or sewer service you are encouraged to call the business office at 812-372-8861 and follow the prompts.

A feature Film called ” the Mastermind” plans to be filming locally in Columbus over the next few days in and around local neighborhoods. The scenes are scheduled to be filmed on Tuesday and Wednesday October 29th and 30th from approximately 7am until 7pm both days.

Film Crews will be working with the Columbus City Engineering Department, Columbus Traffic Department and Columbus Police Department to ensure everything runs smoothly.

In preparation for the filming, several street closures and parking restrictions will be in effect and will be monitored by the Columbus  Police Department for pedestrian safety

The Closures will include:

5th Street between Franklin and Pearl Streets.

Lafayette Street between 4th and 5th Streets

There will be intermittent closures on:

4th Street between Franklin and Lafayette Streets

7th Street between Franklin and Pearl Streets

and Franklin Street between 4th and 7th Streets

No on street Parking, designated lot parking will be allowed in these areas on the 29th and 30th.

Any parking restrictions will be posted 24 hours in advance

The movie is set in the 70s, so the film’s Art Department  is requesting local neighboring residents to please avoid  loud noises like mowing or leaf blowing those days.

A Deceased Man who was found locally over 25 years ago has been identified after years of dead end leads.
On January 30th, 1999, CPD officers were called to a deceased man being found alongside Jonathan Moore Pike near Carr Hill Road. The man was believed to be in his 50’s or 60’s and died by a single gunshot. Two handguns were found with the man, but he did not have any identification or anything with him that led investigators to his identity. His death was determined to be a suicide.
Investigators tried numerous different ways over the years to identify the man, including running his fingerprints, asking for the public’s assistance in news releases, sending bulletins to regional law enforcement, and entering his descriptors into nationwide databases, including the missing person database. The FBI was able to recreate a photo of what the man looked like when he was living. However, none of these things led to any identifying details about the man. Local Investigators were continuously met with dead end leads.  Working in conjunction with the Bartholomew County Coroner’s Office and the Bartholomew County Prosecutor’s Office, local investigators enlisted the assistance of Othram, a Texas-based corporation specializing in forensic genetic genealogy. After a sample of the man’s DNA was sent to Othram, new leads were generated that led investigators to central Ohio, where a nephew identified the man from the FBI recreation photo and provided his own DNA to confirm the man’s identity as Leo Michael Murray.

Murray, a resident of Ohio was 61 years old when he died. Murray had never been married and had no children. He told family he was moving to Florida before he disappeared, which is why his family never reported him missing to the local police.

Some of the  resources used for investigating  were funded by Bartholomew County Coroner’s Office and NamUs, a national information clearinghouse and resource center for missing, unidentified, and unclaimed person cases across the United States. You can more information about forensic genetic genealogy, cases solved using it, and fundraising opportunities at Othram’s website, at https://dnasolves.com.

The CPD encourages anyone who is missing a loved one to report their disappearance to law enforcement for entry into a national database of missing people. For  the Columbus Police Department, there is no minimum amount of time a person must be missing before they enter a missing person into that database.

Photos Courtesy of The Columbus Police Department:

This attached photo was taken at the scene in 1999.

Leo Michael Murray

FBI Recreation Photo of Murray