Community honors fallen firefighter
FORTVILLE — More than 300 firefighters, family members and friends filled the chairs in the Mt. Vernon High School gymnasium Tuesday to pay their respects to Richard Rehm, a longtime McCordsville Fire Department volunteer firefighter who died after his car was struck by a train Christmas Eve morning while he was responding to an emergency call.
His was the first line-of-duty death of a local firefighter in more than 20 years.
Rehm became a volunteer firefighter at 18, a role family members said brought him great pride. Rehm served the McCordsville Volunteer Fire Department for the past 16 years and had been awarded his 25-year pin by the Indiana Volunteer Firefighters’ Association.
Woman killed in three-car crash
NEW PALESTINE — A woman was killed Wednesday morning in a three-car accident in New Palestine.
The accident happened around 9:30 a.m. in front of the First Merchants Bank in the 7000 block of U.S. 52 in New Palestine, police said.
The victim, Tammy Farver, 41, of Indianapolis, was driving west on U.S. 52, preparing to turn south into the bank parking lot when her vehicle was rear-ended by a wrecker driven by Jason Holderfield, 33, of Indianapolis, police said.
Farver’s car was pushed into oncoming eastbound traffic, where it collided head on with a sedan driven by Heather Christopher, 47, of New Palestine.
Farver also was transported to Methodist, where she died from her injuries, police said. Christopher was taken to Indiana University Health Methodist Hospital, where she was treated for non life-threatening injuries.
Holderfield, who was not hurt, told police he didn’t remember the crash or how it happened.
EH renovates its special education classrooms
CHARLOTTESVILLE — Eastern Hancock School Corp. will undertake an approximately $150,000 renovation of its elementary and high school essential skills classrooms in response to the dissolution of Hancock Madison Shelby Educational Services, a three-county special education cooperative set to disband at the end of this school year.
The co-op for more than 30 years provided support services to students from Hancock, Madison and Shelby counties; it announced plans to dissolve after two of its largest school districts pulled out of their agreements in an effort to have more local control over programming.
The renovations coming to Eastern Hancock’s classrooms for children with disabilities will allow students to have hands-on practice with everyday tasks, from how to measure ingredients for a recipe to how to load a washer and dryer.
