Voters in Ellettsville and Richland Township will decide in November whether to reorganize their local governments into a single entity.
The proposal would expand the Town of Ellettsville to cover essentially the entire 35-square-mile Richland Township. It would change who provides some services, who controls planning and zoning, and how some local taxes are collected.
Read the full plan here.
The proposal has also prompted questions from residents about what they would get in return.
Richland Township resident Ellen Cramer attended a public forum this week looking for answers.
“I knew I was getting a lot of misinformation, getting a lot of points of view from one side or the other, and I really didn't know the truth,” Cramer said.
What would change?
If approved, Richland Township government would eventually be dissolved and consolidated into Ellettsville.
The plan creates separate rural and town districts, meaning some taxes and services would remain different depending on where residents live.
Planning and zoning authority for rural Richland would move from Monroe County to Ellettsville.
William Ellis, an Ellettsville Town Council member who also served on the reorganization committee, believes that would give rural residents more control over land-use decisions.
“Everything else, tax rates, planning and zoning — all that is controlled by the county, and the county has taken a very anti-growth and anti-property-rights position from a lot of Richland Township residents,” Ellis said.
The reorganized town would also take responsibility for roads and become the primary police agency in the area.
Fire protection would largely remain unchanged because the Ellettsville Fire Department already serves Richland Township.
Ellis said expanded police service and greater control over property are among the benefits rural residents would receive.
“They'll have a police department that'll dispatch from Ellettsville, and we'll be increasing those numbers,” Ellis said. “But I think the big selling point: they are going to get property rights they have not had in decades.”
The reorganization would also eliminate the elected Richland Township trustee and three-member township board.
Township assistance such as emergency help with utility bills would continue through a new town department, while Ellettsville's Town Council would expand from five to seven members.
Justin Ross, a professor of public finance and economics at Indiana University's O'Neill School, said rural residents would take on additional financial responsibility while gaining a greater role in decisions made by the larger municipality.
“While they pick up a responsibility to help pay for some of those public services, they also get a say in what the town will do in the future,” Ross said.
What would it cost?
Taxes have been a major source of confusion around the proposal.
The fiscal analysis estimates a $300,000 home in unincorporated Richland Township would pay about $173 more per year under reorganization.
But voting no does not necessarily mean taxes stay at current levels.
Ellettsville and Richland Township have already approved a fire territory that is expected to take effect if reorganization fails.
Ellis has argued that would make voting no more expensive for rural residents.
“If they reject it, the fire territory kicks in,” Ellis said. “So there's been some hubbub online that I've said no vote's a vote for higher taxes, and I stand 100 percent behind that.”
The town's fiscal comparison estimates that a $300,000 rural home would pay about $198 more annually under the fire territory, about $25 more than under reorganization.
For a $300,000 home already inside Ellettsville, the analysis projects no reorganization-related increase because the property is already at Indiana's one-percent homestead property-tax cap.
Cramer, however, said she plans to vote against the proposal.
“I'm going to vote no,” Cramer said. “I'm pretty sure about that because I live in a developed subdivision. I don't see that the local planning and zoning is going to do anything for me or my neighbors, and I think that our taxes will go up.”
The separate rural and town districts are intended to keep rural residents from immediately paying every tax associated with the existing town.
Existing Ellettsville debt, for example, remains with taxpayers inside the current town district.
“It's not fair to the township residents to pay for infrastructure and for staffing that they never had a vote on,” Ellis said. “So what we're trying to do is only pay for the increase in services.”
A complicated choice
The referendum has an unusual requirement.
It must receive a majority of voters in existing Ellettsville, a majority of voters in unincorporated Richland Township, and a majority among the combined electorate.
If any one of those voting groups rejects the proposal, the reorganization fails.
Cramer said that after attending the public forum, she still had more research to do.
“There was so much going back and forth about taxes and how it would affect taxes, and then we got off topic, so I felt a little uninformed,” she said. “I don't think the meeting cleared a lot up.”
The referendum will be on the Nov. 3 ballot. If approved, the reorganized Town of Ellettsville takes effect Jan. 1.
