The territorial battles inside Hamilton County have taken a strange turn in recent weeks.
Adams and Jackson townships are each working toward their individual consolidation plans. Fall Creek and Delaware townships are now seeking a different form of consolidation with Fishers.
All four townships are also seeking to secede from Hamilton County.
In addition to a ballot measure in November to consolidate Adams Township and Sheridan into a unigov, that township is simultaneously appealing to the State of Indiana to become part of Boone County instead of Hamilton.
Likewise, Jackson Township is asking voters to approve a unigov-style consolidation of the Township with one or more of its three towns and is appealing to the State of Indiana for the right to become part of Tipton County.
The Fall Creek/Delaware/Fishers situation is a little different. While those three entities are not seeking to consolidate into a single governmental unit, they are asking the State for the right to fully secede from Hamilton County and become Indiana’s 93rd county.
Hamilton County’s commissioners and council have washed their hands and walked away from this fight, telling The Reporter they will leave it up to the voters and state officials to sort out.
“It will never happen, but if they do pull this off, someone in one of those counties owes the remaining residents of Hamilton County a rather large check to repay taxpayers for all the work we just sank into this U.S. 31 water project,” one county councilmember said. “It doesn’t need to be one of those big photo-op checks, but it will need space for a lot of zeros!”
Adams Township
“Westfield is trying to gobble us up,” Sheridan’s Otis “O” MacDonald said. “If they do, what will happen to my farm? They want to start with those 30-some acres down south, but it won’t stop there, I tell you. It won’t stop anywhere near there! In a few years we’ll all be living in a city. No one moved here to live in a city. We need a county government that will protect us and let us preserve our culture. You know what else? Hamilton doesn’t even HAVE a rodeo, but Boone has the one our kids compete in.”
According to Sheridan Community Schools (SCS) officials, becoming part of Boone County will be a win.
“It does a few things,” SCS officials told The Reporter. “Right now, we have to publish all our public notices in newspapers in two counties because some of our students come from across the county line. Publishing in one newspaper will save us several hundred dollars every year. Do you know how many art supplies we can buy with hundreds of dollars? How many basketballs? This move will be like mini-Christmas for our students.”
Without an influx of new residents from Westfield developments, SCS can also keep class sizes small.
“We can keep our teacher-to-student ratios low and keep excelling in academics,” school officials said.
Boone County officials said they’re excited to bring Adams Township into the fold, both because of the fine school system and also because of the water resources.
Hamilton County has been planning to pump up to one million gallons of water per day from Sheridan along the U.S. 31 corridor both for the planned Nation Guard facility and for the explosion of development expected in the next several years once water and sewer lines are in place.
“It’s no secret that Lebanon needs water,” one Boone County official said. “If – I’m sorry – WHEN Adams Township becomes part of Boone County, we can look at bringing some of what will be our own water to the places in this county that need it. That’s not for some potential future growth, but for the growth already happening right here.”
Westfield
“I don’t know if anyone remembers this, but in 2004 Carmel tried annexing seven-and-a-half miles of our land,” Westfield city officials told The Reporter. “That was between State Road 32 and 146th Street and from Ditch Road to Little Eagle Avenue. Back then, that would have been 3,000 people who would instantly have become Carmelites against their wills. We’d never do anything like that. It’s not like we’re trying to swallow Adams Township all in one bite. We’re just nibbling a little on a patch of land where no one even lives yet.”
Jackson Township
“Westfield isn’t just coming for Adams Township,” Jackson Township officials said. “They want both sides of 31 all the way up to the county line. We can’t have that. We need to be able to control our own destiny. This move just makes sense. We have more in common with Tipton than southern HamCo. No one in Tipton is trying to be Little Indy. We will miss our hometown newspaper though.”
One consideration for Jackson residents is taxation. Several former Hamilton County residents have moved to Tipton County in recent years specifically to get lower property tax bills.
“I can look out my back door and see Hamilton County,” one such resident said. “Every time I do, I just smile. Maybe money can’t buy happiness, but taxes sure buy unhappiness!”
While the Town of Atlanta is not convinced it should consolidate with the rest of the township to form a single governing body, they do see advantages in being part of Tipton County.
“Every year at our New Earth Festival there are all these people who set up on the north side of 296th Street to sell food and whatever else,” one Atlanta town official said. “Since that’s in Tipton County, we can’t charge them any booth rent and they’re taking away money from this town by just riding on our shirttails. It makes me so crazy! But if we are all one big happy Tipton family then all that money will go to our town – where it belongs.”
The Nickel Plate Express (NPX) has been trying to convince Tipton County to pay for track repairs so the train can run from Forest Park all the way to the town of Tipton. If Jackson succeeds in seceding, that negotiation gets a lot easier.
“Now that The Shack is back, we’d love to take riders up there,” one NPX spokesperson said. “If most of our rail is on the Tipton side of the line, that county will pony up for the express in no time.”
Hamilton Heights Schools is looking forward to being the big fish in a small athletic pond.
“We are already a great school with a great athletic program,” Heights officials said. “But can you imagine how bright we’ll shine up there? When we keep winning like we already do, Tipton might even throw us a good old-fashioned tickertape parade or two.”
Tipton County officials told The Reporter there is a strange and unexpected benefit to this plan.
“Look at that map,” officials said. “Our county will be shaped like a capital T.”
Fishers
And then there is Fishers.
Fishers, Delaware Township, and Fall Creek Township have asked Indiana to let them break away completely and become an as as-yet-unnamed 93rd Indiana county. The overall cost to the state if that were to happen is still unknown.
“You start talking about adding a county and there’s just a lot that comes with that,” one state senator said. “You’ve got to reorganize tax allocations. You’re talking about a new number to add to license plates and court documents. Then there’s the question of the whole county numbering system. Right now, counties are numbered according to their alphabetical order, so what the heck do we do about that?”
Fishers first proposed naming their new county “AA County” in part so they would sort at the top of the list and thus become County No. 1, forcing the other 92 counties to bear the cost of renumbering.
“We also thought AA would be a great county name since it matches our S&P bond rating,” Fishers city officials said.
Fishers has been working on this plan for several years.
“The pandemic gave us a great opportunity to test the waters and set the stage for this,” city officials said. “We formed our own health department, and no one batted an eye. There’s one new county problem solved right there. We are the home of the Humane Society for Hamilton County, but rebranding will only take a few signs and website redesign. We have great fire and police departments. All we really need is a court and a jail. And honestly, we’d be happy to pay Hamilton County to house our criminals.”
Many residents approve of this secession plan.
“We’ve outgrown Hamilton County,” local resident Tippi Hedren said. “This place is for the birds! It’s time to go.”
Conclusion
If you made it this far before picking up the phone to call an elected official, thank you for gathering all the facts first. Here’s the most important fact of all: today is April 1 and this was our annual joke. No one is seceding.
Ha, ha, well done. I confess I made it to the end of the article the whole time wondering how is this possible! Well done HCR!
Outstanding prank.
Be nice if we could actually join Tipton County, they have county commissioners who actually lesson to the people and are not only concerned with taking care of themselves and their wealthy friends.