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Discussion about the downtown Warsaw parking garage and funding for the Warsaw Municipal Airport and Stillwater Hospice came up today during day one of the Kosciusko County Council’s two-day budget hearings.
Those conversations took place when Commissioner Cary Groninger and County Administrator Marsha McSherry presented the commissioners’ 2026 budgets.
While on the Economic Development Income Tax (EDIT) Fund, Councilwoman Rachael Rhoades asked which part of that was what the county contributed to the airport. The county had $500,000 budgeted for the airport for the last two years.
Groninger said the “major, major” funding in the EDIT Fund was obviously for the parking garage.
“We have some funds in this year’s budget and we’re moving ahead on that as quickly as we can,” he said. “We have contracted with Design Collaborative to do conceptual drawings to get us to where we’ve got a drawing so everyone knows what we’re getting and what the costs are going to be.”
The county expects to have that in November or early December.
At the commissioners’ Aug. 12 meeting, the commissioners approved an initial offer of $235,000 to Snapping Turtle LLC for the Ameriprise property at 225 N. Buffalo St., Warsaw, for a future parking garage, as part of the eminent domain process.
Councilman Dave Wolkins asked today if $3 million was budgeted this year and $4 million in 2026 for the parking garage and about the total cost of the project.
Groninger said they’re thinking the total project cost is in the neighborhood of an estimated $15 million but they’ll have a hard number once the conceptual design is completed. Of the $15 million, $5 million will be covered by Orthopedic Industry Retention Initiative (OIRI), the city of Warsaw has committed to $2 million to $3 million, leaving the county to be responsible for $7 million to $8 million.
“That’s a rough estimate. That’s why we hired Design Collaborative to do a full design so we could really know what we’re committed to before we start that,” Groninger said.
Even after the conceptual design is completed, he pointed out that there will be a lot more work needed before the project goes out to bid.
“So this is more pretty pictures. We’ll really know how many (parking) spots we’re going to get,” Groninger said. They’ll know which utilities may need to be relocated and anything else they may need to do, “so we’re not going to find some problem after we started, that we’ve done our due diligence.”
The city hired a parking consultant who will be looking at what it’s going to take to maintain the parking garage.
“When we did our parking study, if you remember, a couple years back, they even did a study to show what kind of revenue could be generated along with that. Pretty much what that study said is we wouldn’t get reimbursed for what we invested, but we’d get enough revenue generated ... to cover the ongoing maintenance costs or ability to run it,” Groninger said.
Rhoades asked if more money from OIRI could be used toward the parking garage than the $5 million. Groninger said of the $30 million the OIRI committee has from the state, the $5 million awarded is the largest amount for any of their projects.
“I’d say it’s a pretty generous offer what they’ve given us thus far. It’ll pretty much cover 30% of the costs. Really, we’re getting a 30% discount for our parking garage,” Groninger said.
He said he thinks that has a lot to do with what kind of impact the parking garage will have, such as event parking, business parking, future potential downtown housing and hotel developments, and not just based on what the needs of the county are. With the parking lot project last year across Main Street from the Justice Building, Groninger said they were able to gain about 40-45 parking spaces. However, with the Millworks (former Owen’s Supermarket) residential development project slated to begin within the next 30 days or so, there’s about 25 to 30 cars that park on that side of the building who will need to switch over.
“So it’s going to be really tight,” Groninger stated. “We’re pretty good right now. We have enough surface spots to park all of our county employees, but on those days when the courts are busy ... that’s probably when we’re pushing 100-plus vehicles in the street. And that’s before we take out any parking spots to build a parking garage.”
He said the county is trying to be as proactive as they can through this, but the wheels of county government are slow.
Councilman Delynn Geiger asked how many parking spots will the parking garage have.
“Right now, we’re budgeting at 350 spots,” Groninger said. “The reason we came up with that number, we’re estimating we’re roughly about - on those peak periods when there’s a jury trial going on, we’re probably between 100 to 150 spots shorts. But if and when we get ready to add on to the Justice Building, that current surface lot over there, that will probably take out an additional 150 spots.”
He stressed he’s not saying they’re going to do anything to the Justice Building any time soon, but “we’re trying to have enough foresight that we’re building something that we know is going to serve us not just the next few years, but the next 10-15 years.”
Airport Funds
Wolkins then asked if the airport was still happy with the $500,000 the county had budgeted for them or were they still “pushing” for an airport authority.
In 2023, Airport Manager Nick King gave a presentation to the city’s aviation board on the Warsaw airport becoming a city-county airport, which the board and then city council approved. The county council didn’t approve the airport authority, but in 2024, a memorandum of understanding between the county and city of Warsaw was approved with the county providing $500,000 toward capital improvement projects at airport.
Groninger replied, “After (Senate Bill 1), the city definitely is being more highly impacted by their revenue losses than what the county is. But, I know several of us were at the meeting last week with ... Thompson and Craig Snow. They know they’ve got some tweaks to do to that.”
He said, “I think we’re able to have that $500,000 in there, we’re able to see a specific project, we’re able to see a project completed and we’re moving things forward. I think, at this point, we’re trying to build that rapport and see how that goes and continue to see good investments happening at the airport.”
He said he knows a lot of people struggle to see the value of the airport to the county, but it’s a huge asset in the county and the city historically has been burdened to shoulder the bulk of that cost.
“I think for us to continue to budget that 500K for them is just a small token of our appreciation for the value that it adds to our community as a whole,” Groninger said.
Would the airport like more funds? He said they probably would, but he’s not heard about a big push for the airport authority, especially right now with all of the SB1 stuff going on and everyone trying to figure out where they’re going to land.
“There are going to be some significant revenue reductions for the city of Warsaw, especially, more so than for the county. They’re going to have to look at how they’re still going to provide those services they do with the money they bring in,” he said.
McSherry pointed out a letter from King in the council members’ packets expressing the airport’s gratitude toward those funds and what they’re going to use those funds for.
Cates said one of the things she liked about the airport authority was that the council would have been able to appoint board members to that board and have a say, but now they’re just giving the airport money. Groninger said the money is for a specific project and the airport has to tell the county what project(s) the money is being used toward. The county isn’t just handing the funds over, so the county has some say in how the funds are used but without burdening county taxpayers with a whole new tax.
Wolkins said he didn’t have a problem with the airport authority, he just had an issue with the city and county both having three representatives on the board when the county should have more say.
Stillwater Hospice
Wolkins also asked today about no funding being given to Stillwater Hospice in 2026.
In the last two years, after Stillwater merged with Kosciusko County Home Care & Hospice, the county continued to give Stillwater funding as they had to KCHCH and other nonprofits. Stillwater received $50,000 in 2024 and 2025. The commissioners didn’t budget any money for Stillwater in their 2026 budget.
Groninger said there aren’t any other counties, of the counties that Stillwater serves, that are giving Stillwater dollars.
“The other thing was, there was some question on whether or not they’re any longer - since they merged - actually a nonprofit. That they may actually be a for-profit entity,” Groninger said.
The services that Stillwater Hospice provides are wonderful and there’s been a lot of people in the community who have benefitted from that historically, he said, but there are other providers out there providing similar services that the county isn’t supplementing. If Stillwater has moved to a for-profit status, Groninger said they didn’t feel like they could continue to support them in a nonprofit role.
Other Items
The county council did not discuss salaries and wages today for any departments as those will be discussed at the end of day two of the budget hearings on Tuesday. All other sections of all the budgets presented today were approved by the council.
Day two of the budget hearings is tentatively scheduled for 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. Tuesday. Today’s budget hearings were scheduled for 8:30 a.m. to 1:15 p.m., but concluded early shortly after 11:30 a.m.
Other department budgets presented to the county council today included Circuit and Superior Courts I and IV, prosecutor, public defender, community corrections, clerk, surveyor, Soil and Water Conservation District, area plan, treasurer, Kosciusko County Convention, Recreation and Visitors Commission, auditor, redevelopment and the council’s own budget.
On Tuesday’s agenda will be highway, Superior Courts II and III, probation, sheriff, coroner, emergency management agency, recorder, assessor, Purdue Extension Office, health department and veteran service officer.
