2026 Primary: Owen County Surveyor

Pam Rogers - R

In the early 1980s, my family and I bought farm land in Owen County. Fast forward, our farm was sold, but I never lost my love for our county. Before I retired from IU School of Medicine, my career journey took me on many paths that steered me to retire in Owen County in 2017. 

My family’s farm is still in operation in Morgan County. My father was a US Army Command Sergeant Major, before he retired and began his second career in law enforcement and security at IU. My mother worked both in and out of our home. I was taught that hard work, dedication to community service and participation with our public service through government participation was a personal duty of everyone to assure the future of their community. I was raised in Decatur Township where I graduated high school from. I continue today, to be active in planning and zoning matters, including Morgan and Owen County.

Although my husband (now deceased) and I could not have children, I am very proud to call dozens of my prior 4-Hers as my extended family. I served as a 4-H leader or volunteer in several counties for 25 years, where I continue my service today. 

Much of my adult life involved service organizations. I am currently an auxiliary member of the VFW, American Legion and a member of the Eastern Star and Amaranths. After retiring, I began as a DNR interpretive guide at our parks, and continue to volunteer in programs such as Master Naturalist. 

How will your experience serve you in this position? Why are you the best candidate for this position?

I bring over 30 years’ experience from my career journey, ranging from facilities and operational management of Indiana/Government public facilities to executive level leadership of programs and construction projects, that required me to write grants and develop budgets for multi-million dollar initiatives. 

I have eight years of experience that required me to work hand in hand with design engineers, surveyors and infrastructure projects. A key responsibility of the county surveyor is to vet each plat and survey submitted for land development petitions to assure our ordinance standards are included and that inconsistencies are reported to the plan commission, prior to being heard. 

For the last seven years you may recall my very active participation in our planning and zoning hearings and the engagement of the comprehensive plan and UDO. I obtained plan commission training by attending programs, when I learned that our county provides no education or training for this membership. I was a commissioner on our plan commission in 2025, and I continue to be very engaged by having a comprehensive knowledge of our fiscal and operational processing within Owen County. 

My professional experience has provided me with the tools necessary to stand toe to toe with elected officials to assure this county is not continuing to put the “cart before the horse.” I do read the fine print, and as county surveyor, attention to detail is critical.

What issues do you hope to address and how?

My primary goal is to ensure that the duties required by law are executed. Our county is required to appoint a registered surveyor, under a signed contract, to administer a state law. IC 36-2-12-11 requires a county surveyor shall keep and maintain a corner record book, and only a registered surveyor may oversee this duty.

Another serious problem I will address, will be in establishing an actual office location where the public can go to engage the county surveyor, and to inspect the legal survey book and its surveys. This is critical to the community, because this legal survey book and process, protects a landowner from losing their property under a claim of adverse possession, when the survey is properly filed and processed in the County Survey Office. This hasn’t been implemented. 

As the only member of the plan commission that isn’t appointed, the surveyor should serve the citizens by being available to answer questions about land development proposals that may impact their interest. Additionally, implementing transparency and making all hearing documents available on the county web page would eliminate arduous records requests and delayed access. 

For five years funds specifically allocated to keeping the corner record book, were redirected to pay the salary of staff that were not permitted, per the state law. I will request a full audit of this department and its finances to assure mistakes are corrected and the county follows the law. 

What else should the public and voters know?

I strongly believe in transparency and that citizens can have active roles in serving on committees. As the surveyor, I would have the authority to appoint these committees to assist this office and its duties on the plan commission. I believe that record requests are a positive sign that the public is interested; that the public has a right to hold elected officials accountable to execute the duty of their office and to comply with the law. It shouldn’t take years and thousands of emails from the public to enlighten officials of certain problems. Communication is critical! Many of our citizens have skills that would be beneficial to help our officials. Many elected officials (not all) are elected because of their name, who they know, or how much they spend on their campaign. Many of you only know me from me speaking out. I am motivated not for the recognition but to make a difference in Owen County, to steward our resources, protect and conserve our water, and to proactively work to stop development of data centers, nuclear power stations and the mid-states corridor from future development in our county. 

You may text me at 317-714-0537. Regardless if I win this primary, I am here to help you, PLEASE VOTE!

Additional Candidate

• Amy Meier (R)