By KATY YEISER, Daily Journal of Johnson County staff writer
The county assessor should handle township assessors' duties. Schools should be funded at the state level. Local government should be more accountable about spending and more transparent.
Those were among the suggestions at a forum hosted by the Indiana Commission on Local Government Reform at Franklin College on Wednesday.
The commission is led by former Gov. Joe Kernan and Indiana Supreme Court Chief Justice Randall Shepard. It was created by Gov. Mitch Daniels in response to the public outcry over property taxes, but the commission is focused on changing local government.
"I know a lot of people are going to say, 'We want to talk about property taxes,' but we want to talk about local government," said commission staff member John Krauss, who moderated the forum.
About 120 people at the forum were split into 12 groups to discuss what local services they need and use and how to deliver those services more efficiently.
Each group enlisted a recorder and reporter to take notes on their recommendations. At the end of the forum, each group's reporter presented the suggestions to the entire forum.
Kraus described the session as "a giant kitchen table discussion that we all have at home."
"Everyone in the room got a chance to speak. At a public meeting, usually only two or three people get to talk," Bloomington resident Michael Thompson said.
The commission will review the suggestions and notes and then develop proposals for the Indiana General Assembly to consider next year.
Most of those attending were government, school and library officials from Johnson County and surrounding areas. Neither Kernan nor Shepard attended.
Ideas to reform local government buzzed around each group for about two hours, but suggestions mainly focused on consolidating units of government, such as shifting the duties of all township assessors and auditors to one county controller.
Some people wanted to consolidate counties and schools and to regionalize some government services, such as parks and recreation and planning and zoning.
One thing they didn't want to see was their ideas and participation ignored.
"Please don't make this an exercise in futility," one woman asked the commission members.
Brian Alvey, a member of the Franklin Mayor's Tax Advisory Council, said it would be a good idea to change how schools are built. He suggested creating a modular system that dictates design and size based on school enrollment, saying it would cut costs and increase efficiency.
If schools needed to get bigger, they could expand without high expenses and long construction projects, he said.
"We need a blueprint for the size and allow schools to work with it," Alvey said.
One architectural company would come up with a few designs for schools to pick from.
This would cut down on money taxpayers spend on architect fees, as well as make emergency training for police and fire departments easier, because once they knew one school's layout they would know them all, he said.
A commission staff member said one plea was stressed more strongly at the Franklin forum than at previous forums: Stop unfunded mandates from the state.
Unfunded mandates require government or private businesses to provide certain services to the public but don't give them any money to pay for the services, which costs local taxpayers, participants said.
Groups also expressed frustration with the multiple layers of government in the state.
Accessing local government services is difficult for most Hoosiers, said Beth Henkel, former commissioner of the Indiana Department of Local Government Finance.
"The structure itself makes it hard to access," she said.
Indiana has 11,000 elected officials, which is more than most states.
Franklin Clerk-Treasurer Janet Alexander said she regularly gets calls that should be directed to township auditors or clerks. Too many layers of government make it difficult for people to keep after an issue they want to solve, she said.
One theme from the forum was that one size will not fit all counties, cities or towns.
Some people suggested that the state give local government a menu of officials to elect. If towns need assessors, they should be able to have them. If they don't, then they don't need to elect any.
"This is an uphill battle. I think they need to reform all the way down from the state to local level," Franklin resident George Adams said.
Before participants talked about reform, they identified government services that are critical to the success of communities and families. By identifying those needs first, participants understood that reforming, instead of cutting, several services might be the best option, Thompson said.
"Generally, one of the interesting things (at all of the forums) is they don't want any service to go away," said commission staff member Jamie Palmer.
"So they really want to provide either the same level of service or a higher level of service, but want us to do it at a more efficient level," she said.