Skinner looks to bright future

• Reprints

Updated: January 25, 2012 9:00AM

CROWN POINT — Winfield Town Council president Paulette Skinner is looking to a bright future for the community along the eastern border of Lake County.

“I would like to be able to bring the town, township, community foundation and Lakes of the Four Seasons to work together for the good of the people,” Skinner said. She added, “In the past some of it has been fractured.”

When it comes to planning events, purchasing necessities like salt, and sharing equipment, Skinner believes the various entities can work together.

In order to make sure that the town remains open and transparent to everyone the town has put up an outside bulletin board to list meetings and agendas.

In addition, the township has a board outside as well. Both are mounted on the outside of the Winfield Township building. Citizens now have two sources to see what is going on. Information about upcoming meetings is on both the bulletin board and on the town’s website.

As the new year sets up, Skinner said, “I’m happy with the council (newcomers). They have taken control of different projects and keep each other and me informed about progress.”

The biggest project she sees is the possible revision of the ordinance concerning the width of the streets. They want to go back to wider streets. “It is a safety issue, and it restores the wide-open effect that people wanted in the beginning,” Skinner said.

The new width would be 36 feet from curb to curb. While exceptions from that rule can be made for various planned unit developments, both residential and commercial, the town is not required to grant that exception or variance.

According to Skinner the town has new people that run the plows. The town has four plows, one small enough for some of the tight cul-de-sacs. All four plows are working.

According to Skinner there were no complaints from residents after the first snow of the year in early January.

Her fellow council members all missed the first big snow. They were in Indianapolis for the Indiana Association of Cities and Towns boot camp for first-time council members.

Skinner told of the projects coming up for this year. Once again the town-wide spring clean-up will be the first weekend in May. The town-wide garage sale will be in early June and the Farmers Market will start at the end of June.

She likes the hot dog carts in downtown Crown Point and said that there is room for a hot dog cart next to town hall.