Evanston Voters To Decide Fate of Township on Tuesday

After voting 2-1 favoring abolishing Evanston Township in an advisory referendum two years ago, voters are again being asked if Evanston township should be discontinued, only this time it’s binding.

When Evanston voters go to the polls on Tuesday (of if they early voted) they will be asked, “Shall the township organization be discontinued and abolished in Evanston Township?”

State Sen. Daniel Biss introduced special legislation last year allowing for a binding referendum for dissolution of Evanston Township. The bill was signed into law by Gov. Pat Quinn last August.

Illinois is one of 20 states that still maintain the township form of government, and has the most townships of any state with 1,433, the Chicago Tribune reported in Seven Ways To Shrink Government.

Townships have recently fallen under fire as archaic relics that collect taxes to fund their own existence. Further, a Better Goverment Association investigative report says most of the services and jobs that townships provide can easily by absorbed by the county or nearby communities.

Of Illinois’ 1,433 townships, 20 of those are coterminous or share the same boundaries as the municipality. Evanston is one of 11 coterminous townships where local government officials serve on the township board.

“We’re the subset of the subset,” Evanston City Manager Wally Bobkiewicz said, who is currently the acting township supervisor.

Evanston Roundtable has an excellent editorial, “Before You Vote,” that lays out the services that the township provides, including:

• Providing financial or general assistance to unmarried adults who have no other means of support;

The City of Evanston has introduced a plan that would transfer the duties and responsibilities of the township to the city. General assistance and emergency assistance programs would be administered under the City’s Health Department, Evanston Roundtable reports.

The Better Government Association believes abolishing townships is the first step toward trimming Illinois’s bloated government, particularly in Cook County.

Evanston taxpayers may start seeing some cost savings and greater efficiencies when both governing bodies are streamlined into one.

Those in support of keeping the township like the checks and balances that two governing bodies provide.

“There hasn’t been organized support or opposition the measure,” Bobkiewicz said. “I've been the acting township supervisor since October 2013. Our director of health [Evonda Thomas-Smith] had day-to-day responsibility for general assistance.”

A “yes” vote means that the township will be abolished.

A “no” means that the township will continue.