The Bluffton Area Chamber of Commerce is back in action with monthly breakfast meetings after a brief summer hiatus. The September 12 meeting introduced members to new Bluffton University President Alex Sider.
BACC director Jim Enneking also provided the following chamber updates.
FLYERS PROMOTE RETAIL AND SERVICES
Chamber members are being promoted with tear-off flyers. A list of retail businesses has been distributed and a services version is in the works.
Signing with Joy: ASL Family Storytime is a new program at Bluffton Public Library, 145 S. Main St.
The program will be held at 6:00 p.m. on the third Monday of the month September-December.
This family storytime event is an opportunity to learn and experience American Sign Language through stories, games and interactive play. The event is open to everyone; no registration is required.
Members of Trinity Evangelical Lutheran Church, 301 North Main Street, Jenera, will observe the annual Shipwreck Remembrance on Sunday, September 21. The services, at 8:00 and 10:30 a.m., will give praise to the Lord for saving the lives of passengers on the “Famous Dove” when it was shipwrecked off the east coast of the United States on September 17, 1831.
Happy Monday, Blufftonites! Here are BlufftonIcon.com's top stories from the week that was, September 8-14. For a chronological look Icon content, visit blufftonicon.com/archive.
The Bluffton Public Library will host the following events and activities during the week of September 15-20. For further details and dates, visit www.blufftonpubliclibrary.org/library-events.
SEPT 12 MEDIA RELEASE__Bluffton students, faculty and staff gathered for a recent forum led by Bethny Ricks ‘06, Bluffton University Trustee, executive consultant and author of Face Forward, who spoke on the topic of decisive decision making, a skill she describes as essential both personally and professionally.
“This topic is really important to me,” she began. “So important that when people ask me one of the skills that I focus on with my children, I say, well the litmus test for whether or not I am a good parent is whether or not they become decisive decision makers.”
OTTAWA__The Bluffton High School cross country team competed at the 23-team Ottawa-Glandorf Blue/Gold Invitational meet on Saturday, September 13.
BOYS RESULTS
Bryan easily won the boys team title with just 26 points. St. Henry came in a distant second with 92 points, followed by Defiance Tinora (94).
The Pirate boys finished 19th with 479 points.
Freshman Atticus Prothro paced Bluffton with a 45th-place showing in a time of 18:19.16. Sophomore Toby Clevidence came in 84th in 19:39.63.
BLUFFTON__The potent Bluffton High School football team dominated Delphos Jefferson 49-6 to successfully open their quest for a Northwest Conference championship on Friday, September 12 at Harmon Field.
The Pirates improved to 4-0 overall and 1-0 in NWC play with the victory. Struggling Delphos Jeff fell to 1-3 and 0-1 in the NWC after the loss.
Bluffton junior quarterback Tayte Giesige tossed three touchdown passes, and Jackson Bowlus rushed for three scores to pace the victorious offense.
The Village of Bluffton is adopting software for future income tax returns and past cemetery data. Details were provided at the September 8 meeting of Bluffton Council.
CityTax software is expected to be adopted in October 2025. The new system will streamline the process and save time for Income Tax Administrator Rhonda Hohenbrink.
CemSites software will be used to keep track of some 5,200 cemetery plot records in Maple Grove Cemetery. Sexton Greg Probst has begun inputting records, which can be accessed at https://bluffton.cemsites.com/ Fire Chief Jon Kinn noted that he has used the system several times already and that some records are 100 years old.
The web page provides information on scheduled burials and recent interments.
