Township merger check

The twelve criteria

Tick every one that is true of your township. Where you are not certain, leave it unticked and note it — an unticked box you have not verified is the most common reason a total comes out low.

• The township did not provide township assistance in either 2023 or 2024.Township assistance is the statutory poor relief function under IC 12-20. This criterion is worth two points — twice any other — because a township that assisted nobody for two consecutive years is the case the statute is most plainly aimed at. Answer yes only if both years were zero.Measured over: Calendar years 2023 and 20242 pts
• The township does not actively manage fire protection or emergency medical services.Read as the statute does: no allocation to a fire or EMS fund, not a provider unit itself, or contracting out 75% or more of its fire and EMS expense. A township that buys fire protection from a city under an interlocal agreement, and does little else, generally meets this.Measured over: Current1 pt
• The township did not file its Annual Financial Report for 2023.The AFR is filed through the Indiana Gateway. If you are unsure, the Gateway publishes what it received; a township that filed will find itself there.Measured over: Calendar year 20231 pt
• The township did not file its Annual Financial Report for 2024.Same test, the following year. These are separate criteria and both can score.Measured over: Calendar year 20241 pt
• The township did not file its monthly upload reports for 2024.The monthly financial uploads to the Gateway, distinct from the annual report. This is one of the four criteria we cannot score from published extracts, so a township officer knows this answer and we do not.Measured over: Calendar year 20241 pt
• The township did not file its monthly upload reports for 2025.Same test, the following year.Measured over: Calendar year 20251 pt
• The township continued — carried forward — its budget and levy for budget year 2024 rather than adopting a new one.A continued budget is one the DLGF carried over because the township did not complete adoption. It appears on the Form 4B for the year in question.Measured over: Budget year 20241 pt
• The township continued — carried forward — its budget and levy for budget year 2025.Same test, the following year.Measured over: Budget year 20251 pt
• The township received fewer than 24 township assistance applications across 2023 and 2024 combined.Applications received, not applications granted, and the two years are added together. Twenty-four across two years is one a month. Note that a township can score here and on criterion 1 both.Measured over: Calendar years 2023 and 2024 combined1 pt
• The township’s certified budget for 2025 was under $100,000.The certified figure, not the advertised one. Where the two differ, certified is the number that governs.Measured over: Budget year 20251 pt
• The trustee position went uncontested or unfilled: no candidate stood in the 2018 or 2022 election, or the office has been vacant more than 30 days as of 1 July 2026.Any one of those conditions scores the point; meeting more than one does not score more. This is a criterion about whether anybody wanted the job.Measured over: 2018 and 2022 elections, and 1 July 20261 pt
• A township board seat went uncontested or unfilled, on the same conditions as the trustee position.Same three conditions, applied to the board rather than the trustee. One point maximum however many seats are affected.Measured over: 2018 and 2022 elections, and 1 July 20261 pt

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