Fundraising Status—We’re Getting Closer, But Not Quite Close Enough—Yet

We are still about $9,000 short in covering our trial expenses. We’ve made progress since our last report to you (November 20th, we were down by about $14,000). So thank you to all who have contributed, including a number of first time contributors. But, there is still a way to go.

The trial is over, but the fight is far from over. There likely will be oral arguments (currently scheduled for December 19th at 1:30p, Hamilton County Superior Court #1), additional post trial motions and briefs, and appeals.

If we win, you can bet Fishers will appeal and we will need to be financially prepared to carry on at the appellate level. If we lose, then we’ll need to decide whether we will appeal; but, so far the consensus from you is that we should.

But, we need about $9,000 to cover current, already incurred expenses and then more for follow-up and appeals.

This really has been a David vs. Goliath effort. At trial, Fishers always had at least six lawyers present (who knows how many were working behind the scenes), plus at least three expert witnesses on contract. We managed quite well with one extremely competent lawyer, his associate, and one highly respected expert witness. No doubt, Fishers has spent well beyond the $1.2 million reported before trial. Likely, the 10:1 ratio of their costs vs. ours has increased to perhaps 15:1.

Nonetheless, Fishers seems to have unlimited financial resources as it would appear that their taxpayers are not too concerned about how much money they are spending, even though the Town Council has cancelled some infrastructure projects due to a lack of available funds. Makes one wonder, doesn’t it?

We, on the other hand, have only you to count on. We proceeded with trial based on your directive and our lawyer did a great job presenting our case. Now we must continue the fight.

This is a tough time of year and a difficult economic time to be asking for money. But, as we all know, we’ve all saved thousands of dollars so far by fighting this unjust forced annexation. Even if we lose but hold off a final court decision until next year, we’ll still save money for another couple of years because, according to our attorney, Fishers can’t legally annex us in 2009 as that is the year before the 2010 census. And if we win, they can’t try to annex us for another four years after that.

If you haven’t contributed or if you can see your way clear to contribute some more, please send a check payable to Geist United Opposition, P.O. Box 56023, Indianapolis, IN 46256; or, contribute online: www.SayNoToFishers.com (click “Donate Now”).

As a reminder, only about 32% of the affected homeowners have contributed money although well over 65% signed remonstrance petitions. Please remind your neighbors that they are sharing in the savings so they should share some of the costs.

Thank you and best regards.