Evansville Courier & Press
A majority of American voters went strongly for change on Tuesday in electing Democrat Barack Obama as the next president of the United States.
It was a historic event that has dominated, post-election, the nation's news, as well it should.
But at the same time, change on a different level - change of tremendous importance to state and local government in Indiana - received a resounding endorsement by voters on Tuesday.
Hoosiers in Evansville and in Indianapolis, and in other parts of the state, voted for progress precisely at a time when we might be more tempted to go into hibernation.
In Evansville and in Indianapolis, residents voted to spend millions on the modernization of their school systems, all with the intention to improve the academic performance of their school children.
Opponents suggested that with the economy in free fall, this was not the time to be spending new revenues on building schools. But as we argued prior to Tuesday, if our state and our community are going to grow and prosper, this is exactly the time to confront the economy, square on with positive action.
Part of that is based on our belief that an improved public education system can be a powerful tool for growing the economy. And part is an acknowledgement of the obvious, that major public works projects, such as building two new schools, give an immediate and direct boost to the local economy, starting with those who do the work.
In Vanderburgh County, voters overwhelmingly endorsed a bond issue for $149 million to build two schools, to improve other school facilities, to modernize technology used by students and to create three early childhood learning centers.
Seventy percent of voters favored the plan. That's quite a change from 2003, when the same community refused by a nearly identical margin to bail out the Evansville Vanderburgh School Corp., which was facing program cuts. That referendum would have allowed the EVSC to raise an extra $10 million a year for seven years, but voters said "no way."
This latest proposition was built from the bottom up, then was sold well as a plan for better educating our children, and was designed in a way so as to not increase property taxes. Still, in today's economic climate, it took courage by voters to embrace such costly progress and change.
Up in Indianapolis, voters did endorse increasing taxes in order to raise as much as $278 million for school construction work.
Statewide, on another front, voters gave Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels a second term, and in doing so, backed a continuation of the dramatic changes be brought to Indiana government four years ago.
Consider that while other states are fretting over what to do about needed and unfunded infrastructure projects, Indiana is out front.
The state has multiple projects under way and money in the bank as a result of Daniels' Major Moves initiative.
And, in another forward-thinking development on Tuesday, Indiana voters demonstrated a willingness to reduce the size of local government. In 30 of the 43 largest townships in the state, voters chose to eliminate the offices of township assessor.
Indiana Supreme Court Chief Justice Randall Shepard, who headed up the Kernan-Shepard Commission on government reform, said the results show that voters are "willing to change, willing to hear the argument" for abolishing township-level government.
That commission recommended earlier the complete elimination of township government in Indiana, a move long overdue.
After Tuesday's votes, what remains are the township trustees, who administer poor relief and perform other township fuctions, and those relatively few assessors who have not been eliminated by vote or legislation.
Shepard, in a speech in Indianapolis this past week, suggested that political resistence to the rest of what his commission has recommended is phenomenal.
"The turfdom and the comfort with the existing arrangements is substantial," he said, and indeed, it is.
But we suspected long ago that the resistence would be strong enough to block the elimination of township assessors, and we were wrong.
Now, if there is any doubt among Indiana lawmakers about the wishes of taxpayers and voters, let them look at Tuesday's results as they prepare for the 2009 legislative session.
Those results tell us that voters are willing to spend money, even in tough times, if the intention is to significantly improve Indiana as a place to live and raise our families. They tell us that the voters are willing to embrace thinking that reaches outside the box (Major Moves), if it has a strong potential for positive result.
The votes tell us that Hoosiers are more than willing to eliminate or merge local government offices, if it makes good sense. And frankly, we can find no good sense in continuing to shell out tax money to pay for duplicate government offices.
Indiana voters had a lot to say on Tuesday.
We hope our lawmakers were listening.