3-Citv Consolidation J

Rock Island, Moline and East Moline civic forces lead effort to create third largest city in Illinois.

By HOWARD FERGUSON*

HE popularity of various possible solutions to the problems of met-

ropolitan area government runs in cycles, which, at their peaks, have the savor of fads. Until half a cen- tury ago, for much of the country, the absorption of whole cities and innumerable villages into their larger neighbors was an accepted way of meeting the problems of urban ex- pansion before transportation facili- ties permitted urban sprawl. In more recent years, this method has come to be considered, in many quarters, as impractical of achievement. It is obviously out of the question as ap- plied to any effort to unite into one local government the entire mega- lopolis in such areas as the north- eastern seaboard or the southern Lake Michigan shores.

This, however, probably does not justify the pessimistic extrapolation of such a conclusion to embrace all municipal consolidations. There are many settings in which consolida- tion offers real opportunities to in- crease the effectiveness and efficiency of local government without having to ride roughshod over any political verities. This appears to be particu- larly true in suburban areas. It is probably too much to expect political

* Mr. Ferguson is a supervising prina- pal associate with J. L. Jacobs & Com- pany. He has been a consultant in public administration and finance for many years and beaded the fe;fsibiiity study for the proposed consolidahon.

or municipal sponsorship for such consolidations because, inevitably, a few elected offices must disappear in the process. But in the suburbs, few of these are held by hard core professional politicians and fewer still are more than part-time, poorly paid jobs.

An interesting move is approach- ing a climax in the cities of Rock Island, Moline and East Moline, Illinois. Under civic leadership and with private financing, the citizens of these three cities are being asked this year to vote on uniting them into one. A favorable vote in each of the ’ three will effect the consolidation.

The three cities occupy a solid band of urbanized area along the Illinois bank of the Mississippi River opposite Davenport, Iowa, and its satellite, Bettendorf. The whole bi- state metropolitan area of three counties, as now defined, had a 1960 population of 319,000, of which 200,000 are on the Illinois side of the river.l The largest city, however, is Davenport, which had a 1960 population of 89,000. Rock Island’s population was 52,000; Moline, 43,000 and East Moline, 17,000.

Davenport and Rock Island were both incorporated in the 1840’s and

1 Henry County, Illinois, with 49,000 population, has been added to the metro- politan area since the 1960 census. Rock Island County, Illinois, had 55 per cent of the population of the two-county metro- politan area in 1960.

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Moline followed in the 1850’s. Dav- enport took the lead in population from the start and was larger than Rock Island and Moline together until 1900, when their combined population took a small lead which it still maintains. The incorporation of the smaller cities of Bettendorf and East Moline between 1900 and 1910 has not affected the balance. As the largest city, Davenport has continued to maintain its lead as the business center of the metropoli- tan area.

The municipal officials in the sev- eral cities of the metropolitan area have developed and maintained good working relationships on a large va- riety of matters and the industrial leaders have done the same through an active industry committee.

All of the cities have had relatively good administrations and have con- ducted the public business with a frugality that has appealed to both homeowners and industry, without overlooking the need for normal ame- nities. There is a strong industrial base in all of them, with Deere and Company as the largest home-based industry on the Illinois side.

The Illinois cities occupy a penin- sula of high ground between the Mississippi and Rock Rivers with Rock Island at the western tip and Moline adjoining. East Moline occu- pies only the Mississippi side of the peninsula, adjoining Moline. There is not even it marked reduction in the density of occupancy to mark the lines between the cities.

In recent years, Rock Island has annexed undeveloped land across the Rock River to break out of the con- finement of its restricted boundaries.

The city has also done extensive urban renewal work to improve its industrial and commercial potential and it won an All-America City award in 1954.

Moline’s commerci4 volume has been rising more than proportionately, partly because of the addition of a large shopping center near the south- ern edge of the city. It has passed Rock Island in sales tax receipts.

East Moline has a greater propor- tion of industrial properties than either of the other two and, because its space is not constricted, it has recently attracted more than its proportionate share of new residen- tial development. Its growth has thrown heavy burdens on the city government in keeping up with the needs for waterworks expansion, sewerage and municipal services generally. * * *

Possibly because of some of the municipal problems, the young mana- ger of the East Moline-Silvis Cham- ber of Commerce, Charles C. Isely 111, began working on the idea of consolidation of the municipalities with the encouragement and financial backing of the larger industrial firms located in the area. The Illinois mem- bers of the metropolitan area in- dustry committee generally were sponsors.

A merger committee of 35 mem- bers was formed early in 1964 with balanced representation among the three, although some of the com- panies have interest in two or all three of the cities on the Illinois side. This committee was later renamed the Joint City Unification Commit- tee. The larger group set up a small

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steering committee under the chair- manship of Richard Evans of Moline, head of The George Evans Corpora- tion, one of several prominent locally owned industries.

An early decision was made to see if it was feasible to proceed under an existing enabling act permitting the uniting of cities upon a favorable referendum vote in each of those affected. Under this act, the voters of any municipality included in the plan would have the veto power over the whole plan. It was, therefore, decided to omit the smaller cities of Silvis (adjoining East Moline on the east) and Milan (across the Rock River from the main part of Rock Island but adjoining the newly an- nexed area on that side of the river).

A further determination was made that it would be psychologically im- practical It0 proceed under the stat- utes permitting one municipality to be annexed to another.

The steering committee secured pledges of sufficient private funds to proceed with its feasibility study and engaged J. L. Jacobs and Company, consultants in public administration and finance, for the task. The assign- ment included an examination of the feasibility and practicability of a combined operation of the three cities, the impact of such action on overall costs and its impact on the taxpayers of each of the cities.

The enabling legislation had been on the statute books in one form or another since the 1870’s, but had been revised in 1941. A number of years ago, the cities of Champaign and Urbana failed in an effort to consolidate under this law, but the effort produced. a favorable court

test of the constitutionality of its provisions. A move was also under way for the cities of Bloomington and Normal to unite at the time the Joint City Unification Committee was set up.

Each proposed use of the enabling legislation had produced a need for some changes in it. It was discovered in the course of the Jacobs study that the statute, as then worded, could not be applied to the local situation without blocking effective financing of the united city. Several other criti- cal defects were also discovered, in- cluding the absence of any provision for adoption of a council-manager plan without a hiatus and a subse- quent independent referendum. * * *

Rock Island is operating success- fully with a city manager, while the other two cities have the mayor and council form. I t was generally con- ceded by the steering committee that Rock Island voters would reject the merger if it involved dropping the council-manager plan.

The sponsors of the proposed con- solidation of Bloomington and Nor- mal also wanted amendments to pro- vide for a city manager, since both were already council-manager cities. Some difference arose over which of the two Illinois optional plans should be provided for, The Bloomington people wanted to continue with elec- tion of the council at large, whereas it was apparent in the Rock Island- Moline-East Moline situation that representation on the council from each of the cities was imperative if the proposed merger was to have a Chance.

It would have been possibIe to pro-

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vide for both options in the enabling legislation, but the need for this was dispelled when an advisory referen- dum was called in Bloomington and Normal with little or no educational campaign. The unification plan lost. Local option prohibition in Normal was a big factor, since its supporters were not convinced of the practicality of relying on its continuation through freezing of the existing ordinance after the cities were combined.

Amendments to provide for the option of the council-manager form of government, with a large council elected from wards and corrective provisions on several financial and other technical points, were enacted by the state legislature in 1965, but not until near the end of the session in the summer. * * * As soon as there was a sound legal

basis to work from, the consultants completed their report and submitted it in August 1965. It recommended the consolidation on the basis of sub- stantial savings in total operating costs. The report showed that most of the savings would accrue to the Rock Island taxpayers while the financial effect in Moline would be small. For East Moline taxpayers, the necessity of bringing the levels of city services up to those of the other cities would add costs, which would very likely have to be added anyway to meet growing needs.

The biggest advantage to East Moline would be elimination of the necessity for a large expansion of the waterworks, which the city could hardly afford. The delay occasioned by the necessity for amendment of the enabling legislation resulted in

commitments for the issuance of revenue bonds and expansion of the plant before the feasibility of unifi- cation could be determined and dis- cussed publicly. The bond issue did not require a referendum.

In spite of the fact that there was no immediate financial incentive for the voters of East Moline to join with the other cities, the steering committee determined to test the re- action in each of them to the conclu- sions of the report.

Consideration was given to the possibility of excluding East Moline and submitting a proposal for the unification of Rock Island and Mo- line. This proved unacceptable to Moline representatives because of the assumption that the larger city (Rock Island) would dominate such a merger. One of the soothing effects of the three-city unification plan is the fact that no one of the present cities can control a majority of the city council.

The steering committee represen- tative of each city held one or more closed meetings with the other repre- sentatives of his city on the general committee in the fall and winter of 1965-1966, before the feasibility re- port was made public. Each of these delegations concluded that the pro- posed unification should be brought to a vote. The statutory timetable for action after petitions axe filed is rigid, however, and no one wanted to be caught with too little time to reach the electorate. Hence, it was decided to proceed with a “soft-sell” campaign and avoid meticulously any conflict with political campaigns, primaries or general elections,

An educational campaign is on

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now and petitions are to be circulated after the spring municipal elections. The whole movement has been pri- vately sponsored and privately f i - nanced. The cooperation of City officials was enlisted in supplying information for the feasibility study but it was rather generally assumed that they could hardly be asked to support a move that might adversely affect their own personal situations. * * *

The largest appeal in the proposed merger may well be the fact that the new city would be the largest in the metropolitan area and might, thereby, become in fact the core city. It would also be the third largest city in Illi- nois. It is the strong opinion of the sponsors of the consolidation that these factors and the unity of spirit that a favorable vote would indicate could have an important influence on the economic development of the Illi- nois part of the metropolitan area and, through that, of the whole area.

For other metropolitan areas, a favorable vote here would lend new hope to the application of municipal consolidation as an important mea- sure in meeting metropolitan prob- lems. Particularly, this lesson might be that consolidations that do not include the core city may still be an avenue to more effective handling of

metropolitan problems and may not encounter as many difficulties as nor- mally would face any effort by a core City to take over its neighbors. A merger among equals carries a different connotation from one that simply means the absorption of a small neighbor,

A NEW APPROACH (Continued from page 254)

operative action at the local level; we should provide broad, but flexible, home rule powers and we should in- augurate programs of structural re- organization where they are appro- priate.

All of which is by way of saying that the cooperative, flexible powers and structural approaches to home rule may each have a great deal to offer in specific situations, but they will only be as effective as the quality of political leadership which stands behind them.

EDITORIAL COMMENT (Continued from page 249)

vigorous demands for a change in the fundamental law of the state, a com- mission of fifteen, appointed by the governor to revise the constitution of the state, is at present engaged in this work.