Brian Howey: Daniels, Kernan and Trustee Grove talk townships
Submitted by kpaul.mallasch on Thu, 02/19/2009 - 2:12pm.
By Brian Howey
KOKOMO, IN - Back in the late 1980s as a reporter with the Elkhart Truth, I received a call from a manager at LaCasa, a Goshen community housing development corporation. The Elkhart Township trustee, David Hoevener, was elected in 1986 on a platform of saving tax dollars. It was rumored that he had a unique way of doing it. When a person seeking poor relief showed up at his office, he would allegedly open a drawer and lay a revolver on his desktop. LaCasa and other agencies claimed their budgets were overwhelmed as the trustee outlays plummeted.
I decided to check it out. I didn't shave or shower, put on some ratty painting clothes, smoked some cigarettes, then parked a couple blocks away from the trustee's office and made an application for poor relief. The trustee did not display a handgun, but at one point said, "Are you looking for violence?"
Of Indiana's 1,008 township trustees, Hoevener was a true aberration, but he illustrates the greater problems of township government that historically has had few metrics and very little oversight. To the best of my knowledge authorities never investigated the allegations, something that surely would have happened had he been a county official. Hoevener was not re-elected and in later years, picked up a conviction for carrying a gun into a courthouse according to an Elkhart Truth article.
As the Montgomery County League of Women Voters found, only a handful of its 11 trustees are listed in the phone book or had signs outside their offices. Statewide, there's inconsistency from township to township for how property is assessed or poor relief is managed.
When Gov. Mitch Daniels and former Gov. Joe Kernan convened the first "mysmartgov.org" town hall in Kokomo on Tuesday, Liberty Township Trustee Linda Grove, Greentown, immediately confronted them. She invited them and reporters to her office, saying, "If any of you have actually been to a township trustee's office, I could show you what we do."
She ended with a plea: "Don't take our jobs away. Countless jobs are going to be lost when you remove the township trustee, the board members. How many people in Indiana are going to be out of jobs?" When she finished, one person out of 200 applauded.
Daniels thanked Grove for her public service and noted that in six years of travel across the state as candidate and governor, "You're not going to meet too many people who have been in more offices like yours than I have," he said. "I generally find people who are really working hard. That's never been the issue. It's the system that doesn't serve Hoosiers well."
Daniels continued, "Across this state there are legions of cases where more money is being spent on salaries and administration, quite often on family members. Nepotism is incredibly common. Three fourths of the townships trustees never have an opponent. There are very good people in it and Linda, clearly you are one of them, but that cannot be an excuse to maintain a very old system."
But there was a wrinkle. As Grove got up to speak once again, the trustee explained that her husband is a township employee. "My husband does everything," Grove exclaimed. "He's the cheapest person I can find."
Kernan steered the debate back to Elkhart Township, telling the story of Goshen Mayor Allan Kauffman who wanted to buy a ladder truck for his fire department. So did Elkhart Township, which overlaps Goshen. The mayor and the township trustee initially agreed to buy one, $750,000 ladder truck, but were unable to agree on where it should be housed. The result? Now there are two ladder trucks in fire departments "located less than a mile apart," Kernan said.
In just a few minutes, this unprecedented coordination of two governors from two political parties - once fierce political opponents – revealed the township fault lines of nepotism, a lack of accountability and redundancy.
As Kernan and Daniels spoke, 75 miles to the south in the Indiana Senate, SB482 (that would have eliminated townships in Marion County) was being gutted. Another reform bill, SB512, which originally would have eliminated townships, was changed to preserve townships, but allow county councils to at least approve township budgets. Nepotism would be outlawed. As these bills were being watered down, State Sen. Mike Young, R-Indianapolis, complained that reforms would "force things down people's throats. Let people decide how they want to govern themselves."
At about the same time 150 miles to the north of the Senate, Whiting Mayor Joe Stahura and Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr., were beginning the process of hammering out an agreement to merge their two fire departments. "Pressure on our budget is forcing us to look for ways to reduce our costs," Stahura told the Times of Northwest Indiana.
This is beginning to happen across the state. Logansport and Cass County just merged 911 centers and will save an estimated $400,000 annually. Portage and Porter County are on the same path.
Behind Daniels and Kernan at Kokomo on Tuesday were Republican mayors Mark Smiley of Rochester, Jeff Rea of Mishawaka, Wayne Seybold of Marion, Andy Cook of Westfield, and Democrat mayors Mike Fincher of Logansport and Greg Goodnight of Kokomo. It is testament to the bipartisan nature of this wave of efficiency.
In 2008, the Indiana legislature shifted assessing from townships to counties in all but 44 townships. Last November, voters via referendum ended them in another 31 townships. If you believe in these trends, it's time to write and call your legislator and demand a modern Indiana.
Howey is publisher of Howey Politics Indiana at www.howeypolitics.com.
Area: State Topics: Politics Types: Opinion
KOKOMO, IN - Back in the late 1980s as a reporter with the Elkhart Truth, I received a call from a manager at LaCasa, a Goshen community housing development corporation. The Elkhart Township trustee, David Hoevener, was elected in 1986 on a platform of saving tax dollars. It was rumored that he had a unique way of doing it. When a person seeking poor relief showed up at his office, he would allegedly open a drawer and lay a revolver on his desktop. LaCasa and other agencies claimed their budgets were overwhelmed as the trustee outlays plummeted.
I decided to check it out. I didn't shave or shower, put on some ratty painting clothes, smoked some cigarettes, then parked a couple blocks away from the trustee's office and made an application for poor relief. The trustee did not display a handgun, but at one point said, "Are you looking for violence?"
Of Indiana's 1,008 township trustees, Hoevener was a true aberration, but he illustrates the greater problems of township government that historically has had few metrics and very little oversight. To the best of my knowledge authorities never investigated the allegations, something that surely would have happened had he been a county official. Hoevener was not re-elected and in later years, picked up a conviction for carrying a gun into a courthouse according to an Elkhart Truth article.
As the Montgomery County League of Women Voters found, only a handful of its 11 trustees are listed in the phone book or had signs outside their offices. Statewide, there's inconsistency from township to township for how property is assessed or poor relief is managed.
When Gov. Mitch Daniels and former Gov. Joe Kernan convened the first "mysmartgov.org" town hall in Kokomo on Tuesday, Liberty Township Trustee Linda Grove, Greentown, immediately confronted them. She invited them and reporters to her office, saying, "If any of you have actually been to a township trustee's office, I could show you what we do."
She ended with a plea: "Don't take our jobs away. Countless jobs are going to be lost when you remove the township trustee, the board members. How many people in Indiana are going to be out of jobs?" When she finished, one person out of 200 applauded.
Daniels thanked Grove for her public service and noted that in six years of travel across the state as candidate and governor, "You're not going to meet too many people who have been in more offices like yours than I have," he said. "I generally find people who are really working hard. That's never been the issue. It's the system that doesn't serve Hoosiers well."
Daniels continued, "Across this state there are legions of cases where more money is being spent on salaries and administration, quite often on family members. Nepotism is incredibly common. Three fourths of the townships trustees never have an opponent. There are very good people in it and Linda, clearly you are one of them, but that cannot be an excuse to maintain a very old system."
But there was a wrinkle. As Grove got up to speak once again, the trustee explained that her husband is a township employee. "My husband does everything," Grove exclaimed. "He's the cheapest person I can find."
Kernan steered the debate back to Elkhart Township, telling the story of Goshen Mayor Allan Kauffman who wanted to buy a ladder truck for his fire department. So did Elkhart Township, which overlaps Goshen. The mayor and the township trustee initially agreed to buy one, $750,000 ladder truck, but were unable to agree on where it should be housed. The result? Now there are two ladder trucks in fire departments "located less than a mile apart," Kernan said.
In just a few minutes, this unprecedented coordination of two governors from two political parties - once fierce political opponents – revealed the township fault lines of nepotism, a lack of accountability and redundancy.
As Kernan and Daniels spoke, 75 miles to the south in the Indiana Senate, SB482 (that would have eliminated townships in Marion County) was being gutted. Another reform bill, SB512, which originally would have eliminated townships, was changed to preserve townships, but allow county councils to at least approve township budgets. Nepotism would be outlawed. As these bills were being watered down, State Sen. Mike Young, R-Indianapolis, complained that reforms would "force things down people's throats. Let people decide how they want to govern themselves."
At about the same time 150 miles to the north of the Senate, Whiting Mayor Joe Stahura and Hammond Mayor Thomas McDermott Jr., were beginning the process of hammering out an agreement to merge their two fire departments. "Pressure on our budget is forcing us to look for ways to reduce our costs," Stahura told the Times of Northwest Indiana.
This is beginning to happen across the state. Logansport and Cass County just merged 911 centers and will save an estimated $400,000 annually. Portage and Porter County are on the same path.
Behind Daniels and Kernan at Kokomo on Tuesday were Republican mayors Mark Smiley of Rochester, Jeff Rea of Mishawaka, Wayne Seybold of Marion, Andy Cook of Westfield, and Democrat mayors Mike Fincher of Logansport and Greg Goodnight of Kokomo. It is testament to the bipartisan nature of this wave of efficiency.
In 2008, the Indiana legislature shifted assessing from townships to counties in all but 44 townships. Last November, voters via referendum ended them in another 31 townships. If you believe in these trends, it's time to write and call your legislator and demand a modern Indiana.
Howey is publisher of Howey Politics Indiana at www.howeypolitics.com.
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