Make LaPorte Great Again

11/30/2025

They're gonna need a bigger website 🤣

Explore the Media Bias Tracker that fact checks and holds Fake News accountable. False claims debunked, Hall of Shame for serial offenders, Leaderboard of networks ranked by Repeated Lies. Stay informed, stay accurate.

11/28/2025

City plans to drop a subdivision on Briar Leaf without storm drains? Just flood County parcels & make it a County problem? 🤬

11/27/2025

When government feels hopeless, the ballot box is still the place where hope wins. 💪

11/25/2025

It's that time of year again when we kindly remind LaPorte County residents when to dial 911 on Thanksgiving.

11/24/2025

🎇Spectrum Recycling to Remain in La Porte—City and Company Reach Settlement, Relocation Already Underway

After months of legal wrangling over the City’s condemnation of Spectrum Recycling’s old site on Pulaski Street, the parties quietly signed a settlement this fall that ends the dispute and keeps Spectrum in La Porte.

The agreement calls for the City to pay Spectrum a total of $1.04 million—$508,300 in court-ordered compensation plus $535,000 in relocation payments—to close out all claims.

Spectrum has already begun setting up operations across the tracks at 209 Brighton Street, where it has applied for zoning approval to continue recycling work on a 2.17-acre parcel.

While the City’s handling of the original closure drew criticism for abrupt communication, both sides now appear to have found common ground: the City gets its right-of-way expansion, and La Porte keeps a long-time local employer.

11/21/2025

A sitting Commissioner can use his seat as a bully pulpit, calling our watchdog group names but we'll keep shining a light on public deception & corruption. Let's Go - we have a doozy this morning. Now you know why we jumped on the KIP datacenter and blew it up. You only need to look at Michigan City to see what happpens if you're asleep at the wheel. We digress.

Enjoy and remember these people at election time - they all need gone.

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📌 Project Maize: The Real Timeline Michigan City Doesn’t Want You To See

Everything below is documented through public records, press releases, state filings, local news reports, and now a federal lawsuit. No speculation needed — the facts speak for themselves.

🔹 MAY 2025 — SECRET NEGOTIATIONS BEGIN

❗️ Michigan City officials were briefed on the data center under non-disclosure agreements (NDAs).
❗️ A confidential executive session took place on May 19 to review the proposal.
❗️ Residents were told nothing.

🔹 JULY 12, 2025 — CITY SAYS “NO PLANS TO PURSUE IT”

Michigan City Mayor, Angie Nelson Deuitch releases a public statement claiming:

“No formal agreement was ever reached… there are no plans to pursue the project.”

📄 The Mayor also says the project lacked community benefits and job guarantees.

🔹 JULY 16, 2025 — MEDIA REPORTS CITY ISN’T PURSUING THE PROJECT

DataCenterDynamics publishes an article headlined:

📄 “No plans to pursue $832m ‘Project Maize’ data center, says Michigan City Mayor.”

But here’s the key part…

🔹 EARLY JULY — STATE INCENTIVES WERE ALREADY APPROVED

The Indiana Economic Development Corporation (IEDC) had already approved tax incentives for the data center before the city told taxpayers it wasn’t happening.

So the state was signing off on millions in incentives while the city was publicly denying it.

🔹 LATE AUG–EARLY SEPT — CONSTRUCTION IS ALREADY UNDERWAY

By early September, news outlets report:

✏️ The old 402 Royal Road factory is already being renovated.
✏️ Roof being raised, electrical substation being built.
✏️ Phoenix Investors confirms they have state incentives and are prepping the site.

This is weeks after the mayor publicly said there were “no plans to pursue” the project.

🔹 LATE AUGUST — CITY & CHAMBER SUDDENLY PRAISE THE PROJECT

The Michigan City Chamber flips the script and starts calling Project Maize a “game-changer.”

Their claims:

✏️ “Up to 800 construction jobs”
✏️ About 30 permanent jobs
✏️ Tens of millions in “economic development giveaways”

Funny how those details weren’t shared in July.

🔹 SEPTEMBER — COUNCIL PASSES TAX ABATEMENTS

The Common Council approves four resolutions, including local tax abatements for the developer.

No explanation for the July denial. No transparency about the shift. Just a sudden green light once construction is already in motion.

🔹 FALL 2025 — UNIONS BLOW THE WHISTLE

Local 150 and other trade groups report:

☑️ Most of the construction work is going to out-of-state crews from WI, MI, OH, AL.
☑️ Very few local tradesmen are being hired.
☑️ Taxpayers are subsidizing a project that barely employs local workers.

Again — all documented.

🔹 NOVEMBER — UNION PICKETERS ARRESTED

☑️ Local 150 members protesting on Royal Road were ordered by police to move.
☑️ When they asserted it was a public right-of-way, two were arrested for criminal trespass.
☑️ Michigan City was protecting the developer while local workers were hauled to jail.

🔹 DECEMBER — PHOENIX CONSTRUCTION SUES LOCAL 150

Last week, Phoenix Construction — the general contractor for Project Maize — filed a federal lawsuit against Local 150. 🤬

Case: Phoenix Construction LLC v. IUOE Local 150
Court: U.S. District Court, Northern District of Indiana
Case No. 3:25-cv-00909

Phoenix accuses the union of:

✒️ unlawful picketing
✒️ hurting their business
✒️ “secondary activity” (NLRA §303)

And they want $2+ million in damages from the union that dared to speak up.

The lawsuit PDFs are right here for reference:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1ACDFSHQYuILbl5D9E1Cc3mOiXdVzEGL2?usp=sharing

🔥 FACTUAL TAKEAWAY

Michigan City officials:

📌 negotiated the project in secret
📌 told residents there were “no plans to pursue” a project that was already moving forward
📌 turned around and approved tax breaks once construction was underway
📌 let out-of-state contractors take the work our local tradesmen could have done
📌 stood by while union workers were arrested
📌 are now watching the project’s general contractor sue the union in federal court

We don’t need to add our opinion or spin — this timeline alone is damning. Solar Steve was all in on dropping a secret data center in the county until we exposed him. Stay dilligent. We stand behind our local unions.

11/20/2025

Susan stood up at the Commissioners meeting tonight and said what needed to be said, because Commissioner Holifield decided to smear the people actually doing the work in this county—calling those of us who filed APRA requests “cowardly losers on Facebook.” Let’s be clear: we filed those requests because Gramarossa sat in a meeting talking in circles about contacting unnamed members of Congress to hand the county land for unnamed roads in unnamed locations. Everything was vague, coded, and deliberately opaque. So yes—we dug. We asked questions. We did what residents are supposed to do when officials start getting cagey. That wasn’t gossip or rumor. That was accountability—something Steve and Connie didn’t bother offering.

We caught the formation of Gramarossa’s data center working group. We caught the appointments. We caught the quiet maneuvering. When the “County eyes KIP for a data center” headline hit, we were already connecting the dots. And when we found the site was two miles from the Microsoft project, we didn’t shrug—we hit the horn. Hard. And the county woke up because we made damn sure they couldn’t ignore it.

Our watchdog group put in the hours: reading documents, pulling APRA records, building timelines, posting receipts, linking news articles—laying out the entire picture except for private emails, which we deliberately chose not to expose. Transparency is supposed to come from the officials running the county, but apparently we’re filling the vacancy they left.

So what happens when a room full of residents shows up, informed and ready to ask legitimate questions? Holifield opens the meeting by whining about “misinformation” and taking a cheap swing at a “cowardly loser on Facebook.” That wasn’t an accident. That was frustration—because we dragged the spotlight onto something he and Connie clearly weren’t planning to explain without being forced. They didn’t like that we connected dots they hoped would stay scattered.

And now Steve is trying to play both sides, pretending he’s suddenly anti–data center after the public blowback. Cut the act. You and Connie were fully invested in the KIP plan. If it wasn’t a data center, you shouldn’t have told the paper it was—reporters didn’t hallucinate a headline. Don’t rewrite the timeline now that people are paying attention.

Attached is Susan’s speech and Steve’s campaign material—the same campaign where he promised civility and transparency. Maybe he should read his own words before calling residents names for doing his job better than he is.

11/19/2025

IYKYK: City of LaPorte Riverfront District 2022. ❤️

11/18/2025

Republicans say vote for us; government is broken, we elect them and they prove it.

11/18/2025

No money for roads, sidewalks, or infrastructure fixing, but money for restaurants & local attorney investment properties.

11/17/2025

Angie baby, you're a special lady, living in a world of make-believe, well, maybe.

11/17/2025

Called it 5 years ago when the economic brain trust of LaPorte gave RK an unfair advantage. Keep letting Bert Cook run the show and LaPorte will be nothing but a fast food / gas station pit stop at the intersection of converging highways.