If Townships Perish, We'll Miss Meetings Like Wheatland's

Monday night’s special Wheatland Township meeting on the proposed new town hall presented a clear case both for and against township government.

On the one hand, townships -- one of our pioneering forefathers' first units of goverment -- are not unlike dinosaurs still foraging amid our modern landscape of city and county governments, as Wheatland Township Trustee Karl Karantonis noted.

Watchdog agencies like the Better Government Association of Illinois have for decades said the need for township government is long over.

Brian Blazina, an adjunct professor in leadership and ethics who lives in Naperville, said the Monday night meeting clearly demonstrated that “people are unhappy with their officials and they are pushing back.”

“Illinois has more than 6,500 governmental units just like this one all spending money in closed meetings or open meetings that are not attended,” he said. “They burn your tax money like there is no tomorrow.”

Now is the time, Blazina said, to not be building new township halls, but shuttering the ones still standing.

On the other hand, there’s one thing townships can do that no other branch of government can, and Wheatland was doing it in style last night. Townships have a mechanism in which voters can usurp the power of elected officials. It takes just 15 signatures to get things that are important to citizens on the agenda of the annual town hall meeting, where they can vote on them directly.

In this case, residents took that authority and told the township board in no uncertain terms that they did not want to spend $1.5 million for a new town hall. There is a need for a new building -- that is not in dispute -- but there are less expensive options, residents said.

It was an impressive display, one in which the residents didn't just sit on sidelines but seized an opportunity for change.

If the bells are tolling for townships, the public referendum that was so vibrant and alive in Wheatland last night may be the one thing we will mourn.

ARGOUDELIS WATCH: 203 days since Election Day 2010 and still no statement from Plainfield Township Supervisor John Argoudelis on whether he intends to be both township supervisor and a Will County Board member.