Streamlining government
December 19th, 2007, 7:56 am · Post a Comment · posted by aubreywoods
I recently looked over the Indiana Commission on Local Government Reform’s report on Streamlining Local Government.
There were 27 recommendations, concerning county government, schools, libraries and other areas of local government, issued by the commission.
I’ve cover county government for a number of years and I also cover two school boards so I don’t think I’m going to express an opinion on the recommendations dealing with those areas too much.I think we need to take a serious look at implementing many of the recommendations.
For a long time now, I’ve thought the county needed a “mayor” type person, someone who would be on the job 40 hours a week. I’ve watched the county council and commissioners struggle for years with complex issues they have a hard time getting their arms around.
For one thing, council members and commissioners often work full-time jobs besides their work for the county, and they just don’t have the time it takes to understand the complex workings of government. Even full-time county officials have a hard time dealing with some of the buearacy.
One instance of that occurred this year when the state withheld property tax replacement credit monies because of issues submitted by the county to the department of local government.
Everytime county officials felt they had submitted the correct, the state would ask for more.A county executive should be able to get a better handle on some of these types of issues and might even be able to help the county obtain some of those grants everyone believes is out there to be had just for the asking.
I don’t think that many of the present county officials, including the sheriff, should be appointed by the county executive.
That sure seems to me to be opening the door for a lot of cronism.I also like the idea of establishing a countywide body to oversee the provision of all public safety services.
During my years covering the police beat, I’ve seen many occasions where disputes about jurisdiction have arisen among public safety officials.I also like the idea of joint purchasing by schools although many of our local schools already participate in purchasing cooperatives.
Brownstown Central, for instance, recently decided to purchase three buses through Wilson Education Service Center in Charlestown, avoiding the need for Brownstown to have to go through the bidding process and saving money.Recommendations to move municipal elections to even years so they are held at the same time as other Indiana elections is a good one as well as one moving non-partisan school elections to November during those same elections.
The recommendations are designed to reduce the cost of government and make it more effective and efficient.
I think that Hoosiers need to have the chance to vote on many of these recommendations before they are implemented.
Let’s give them a chance.
