Some events might be wondering “should we have stayed ON as scheduled. As it turned out, many of those cancellations might have been unneeded – but the weekend was not totally without rain, or severe weather. A confirmed tornado affected rural Jay county Friday – you likely heard live coverage with WLBC’s Jared Boomer – no fatalities or injuries had been reported by Saturday afternoon.
After a weekend filled with cancellations – if YOUR event has a new-date, please send us a note, and we’ll tell everyone. Email steve.lindell@woofboom.com. Some that we are aware of: the Muncie Juneteenth event was moved to July 17, Grateful Fest was moved to August 14.
They’re trying to figure out why 22 year old BSU student Montana Miquel Lopez was shot and killed Saturday at about 2 a.m. MPD heard of a “possible fight and shots fired.” Lopez, formerly of Fort Wayne and Anderson, now lived in Muncie.
YMCA and Muncie Community Schools invited the public to a community input event last week at the Ball State University Alumni Center regarding the new facility proposed on the high school property. Both the Y and MCS are still working on a final memorandum of understanding; what officials have told WLBC news recently, is that the new Y will probably be located in an area between the Muncie Fieldhouse and the school. Currently, the potential site, is a parking lot. To fund the space, the YMCA of Muncie will be launching a capital campaign, and still has to decide what it will do with two eventually empty buildings at the Downtown and Northwest Y locations.
A community mourns the loss of two. The husband and wife that were severely injured in a motorcycle crash have died. Ken Mace wrote of his brother and sister in law on social media, “The nursing staff at Methodist was AMAZING and were able to get Kirk and Deb in the same room. Their hands were together when they passed just a few hours apart.”
The Indiana Region of the American Red Cross opened shelters over the weekend in Bloomington and Madison in southern Indiana, and assessed tornado damage in Jay County, Indiana, and Mercer County, Ohio. If you ever want to volunteer – help is always needed.
People are still talking about the abrupt closure of the City of Muncie Friday. At a ribbon cutting Friday morning, no mention of closing, but Mayor Ridenour did specifically say that the City would observe the new holiday in 2022. We asked the Mayor for comment Friday at 2 p.m., and he wrote, “We did close at noon. With no notice from the Feds it was difficult to maneuver around schedules and contracts. I am very happy to close in honor of Juneteenth.”
On Friday evening at approximately 9:20 p.m., the Indiana State Police responded to the area near Summitville – single car crash when Timmy McAfee, 65, from Marion ran off the road and hit a large tree. The driver died, and the passenger, Debbie Meadows, 47, Marion was later transported to an Indianapolis hospital for non-life-threatening injuries. Neither was wearing a seatbelt and cops say both alcohol and drugs were a contributing factor.
It took 6 years for justice to be served – a jury deliberated for about six hours before returning the guilty verdicts early Friday evening in the case of 22-year-old William C. Balfour III, from an attempted robbery and shooting death of Christian Michael Orebaugh. Judge Marianne Vorhees set Balfour’s sentencing hearing for July 16.
