Evansville Courier & Press staff and wire report
Indiana Chief Justice Randall T. Shepard and former Indiana Gov. Joe Kernan have agreed to co-chair a public commission to examine Indiana's current system of local government and make recommendations on reshaping it, officials are announcing now.
The Commission on Local Government Reform, announced by Gov. Mitch Daniels, will begin its work in August. One of the questions the commission has been looking at is whether the township form of government should be abolished.
Shepard is a former Vanderburgh Superior Court Judge and a former Evansville native. He formerly served under the Democratic administration of Mayor Russ Lloyd Sr., a Republican. Kernan is the former Democratic governor, defeated by Daniels in the 2004 election.
Amid a property-tax "crisis" and bickering over whether there should be a special session, Daniels announced his initiative to restructure local government and thus reduce local spending. In the past, Daniels has blamed multiple layers of government for high property taxes.
House Speaker Patrick Bauer, D-South Bend, on Monday suggested spending the surplus and maybe more to further blunt steep increases in property taxes in many parts of the state this year.
Daniels opposed that idea, but said he was open to using part of the surplus temporarily until the state receives $300 million in fees from Indiana's two horse-racing tracks to install slot machines, which legislators already had earmarked for property tax relief.
"I'm open to using part of our hard-won state surplus at least in a temporary way if need be," Daniels said during a Tuesday morning news conference. "But the first thing we should do is use the money already provided by the General Assembly in a more targeted way."
Daniels also said he might order a special legislative session on property tax relief regardless of whether lawmakers agree on an approach ahead of time. "It may well take a special session. I would like to see some coalescence around a good idea first; but I won't hesitate to call one with or without" an agreement, he said. "I'm not prepared to wait for next year."
Daniels has not revealed details, but today he is scheduled to announce plans for a new initiative aimed at reforming and restructuring local government, a spokesman said. In the past, the governor has cited excessive spending by numerous layers of government as contributing to high property taxes.
Meanwhile, Daniels said he expected a decision this week on whether to order a reassessment in Marion County, where the average increase in property taxes is 34 percent and some bills have doubled or tripled. Cheryl Musgrave, the former Vanderburgh County commissioner whom Daniels appointed last week as head of the Department of Local Government Finance, would be in charge of ordering a new reassessment.
The governor said reassessments also might be ordered in other counties where commercial property appeared to have been assessed differently from residential property.
Property tax increases to homeowners are projected to be 24 percent on average statewide this year from a variety of factors. To blunt this year's increases, the state plans to send rebate checks worth $300 million to homeowners late this year or early next year that are projected to lower the average increase to 7.7 percent.
But increases were expected to average about 35 percent or more in at least nine counties, according to preliminary figures from the state's Office of Management and Budget. That has led to several protest rallies attended by hundreds of angry homeowners.
Bauer said a more permanent plan than that suggested by Daniels was needed. "He's not adding any more relief and he's just saying I'll shift it up a few months," Bauer said. "That's not going to solve this problem."