By Dorothy Schneider, Journal & Courier
dschneider@journalandcourier.com
Union Township resident Anita Motton got some much needed help from her township leader at the beginning of this year.
Motton, who lives in a mobile home along with five children under age 18, is unemployed and receives some state assistance. But come January she didn't have enough money to pay her $525 rent.
"With how things are right now," she said, "there's just not enough for everything."
So Motton turned to her township trustee, Bob McKee, who was able to pay most of her rent payment through township assistance funds.
The township assistance program, along with volunteer fire department protection, are two services advocates of township government say will suffer if the Indiana legislature moves ahead with a proposed streamlining bill.
Senate Bill 512, if passed as written, would transfer township duties and property to the county starting in 2013. It's based in part on recommendations in the Kernan-Shepard report, a 2007 critique of Indiana's form of local government.