Algonquin Township voters to decide whether to abolish township in April election

Algonquin Township voters will decide whether to abolish the local government unit in the April election after a petition for a referendum on the matter was certified by McHenry County Clerk Joe Tirio and the township clerk’s office this week.

An effort to gather township voter signatures to get the referendum on the ballot was initiated by McHenry County State's Attorney Patrick Kenneally and former McHenry County Board Chairman and state legislator Jack Franks.

The petition was successful in gaining approval to head to voters in the spring, Tirio said Thursday, and will appear on the ballot barring any formal objections or legal actions taken by voters to prevent that from
happening.

The petition required signatures from 445 township voters to be certified for the upcoming election, and those gathering the signatures were led in part by McHenry Township Trustee Bob Anderson, a longtime critic of the township form of government who is seeking to consolidate the township he helps lead.

Anderson said almost 100 signatures more than necessary were turned into the township clerk and county clerk offices.

When asked for comment by email this week, Algonquin Township trustees offered neither opposition nor support for the ballot measure heading to their voters in April, which would abolish both the township and its associated road district if supported by a majority of voters.

“If there are enough residents who want this on the ballot, then that’s wonderful,” Algonquin Township Trustee Dave Chapman said. “That is democracy in its purest form.”

Attempts to reach other Algonquin Township officials this week were unsuccessful.

Franks in an interview this week cited Algonquin Township's legal bills, amounting to hundreds of thousands of dollars in the past several years, as one reason the township should be eliminated as a governmental body.

The ballot measure will offer the latest test case for how McHenry County residents feel about the framework for township abolition set up by a state bill sponsored by state Rep. David McSweeney, R-Barrington Hills, that was signed into law last year. McSweeney decided against running for another term this past November.

The law allows ballot measures aiming to abolish townships in McHenry County to be submitted to voters through majority votes of township boards of trustees or through petitions like the one led by Franks and Kenneally.

Its constitutionality was challenged in a lawsuit earlier this year. A McHenry County judge dismissed the case, but a local lawyer is appealing that decision.

Voters in McHenry and Nunda townships earlier this year both rejected by wide margins ballot measures that would have abolished those townships. In the case of Nunda Township, the measure would not have eliminated the local government until 2037.

A majority of McHenry Township trustees are opponents of keeping township governments alive and have not abandoned their goal to annihilate the entity. They are appealing a decision by a McHenry County judge made earlier this year that prevented the abolition question from being asked again this past November. The county judge cited state law that prohibits identical ballot measures from being asked more than once within 23 months.

A decision on the appeal has not yet been made, but if the appellate court overturns the ruling, it would allow the township trustees to ask voters to abolish the township again sooner.

In addition to that legal appeal, McHenry Township trustees have sent a ballot measure to voters for the spring election that could eliminate just the McHenry Township Road District, which is technically a separate unit of government from the township itself.

That measure was added to the April ballot after voters in three other townships in the state – Ela, Elk Grove and Bloomington townships – favored eliminating their township road districts during the November election.

Franks said he urged Algonquin Township trustees to refer a township abolition measure to voters but they never discussed the idea, so he and Kenneally went the petition route.

Franks, who lost reelection as County Board chairman last month, said he believes consolidating, eliminating and shrinking local government units to be of utmost importance for McHenry County officials because of they result in overly heavy local property tax burdens.

He called township abolition the “low-hanging fruit” in the effort to peel back layers of local government, especially townships that are in areas that have been heavily urbanized and consist of territory mostly within municipal boundaries, as is the case with Algonquin Township.