Megamerger of Quad Cities?

Voters in five of the eight municipalities that together make up the Quad-Cities region in Illinois will vote November 8 on a proposal to consolidate into a single "super city." If approved, such a consolidation would be unprecedented in contemporary U.S. local government history.

Proposed for consolidation are the three central cities — Rock Island, Moline and East Moline — together with the smaller contiguous communities of Hampton and Coal Valley. Supporters in two other communities, Milan and Silvis, failed to meet the deadline for petitioning for a referendum. The eighth community, Carbon Cliff, is contiguous only to Silvis, and it wound up without a referendum since contiguity is required for consolidation.

Although consolidation has been discussed before in the Quad-Cities, the current effort dates to spring 1986, when the Illinois Quad-City Chamber of Commerce adopted unification of the eight communities as a major project and requested the Center for Governmental Studies at Northern Illinois University to study the feasibility of creating the single super city. With funding from The Joyce Foundation and the Illinois Department of Commerce and Community Affairs, the chamber created a 50-member task force of business, union, civic, minority and governmental leaders, including the mayors of all eight communities, to oversee the effort.

After studies, hearings and more studies, the task force voted in June to recommend that the cities vote on consolidation in November. But the effort was dependent on passage by the General Assembly of S.B. 1761 to establish procedures for what statutes did not cover: simultaneous consolidation of several municipalities. Not until August 4 did Gov. James R. Thompson sign the bill (it covers counties with less than 200,000 population) into law. The deadline was August 22 for putting the proposal on the November ballot. Although Rock Island, Coal Valley and Hampton failed to get enough signatures by the deadline, their councils voted to put the referendum on the ballot.

Passage in November will require a simple majority vote in favor of the question in East Moline, Moline and Rock Island, but all three must approve for consolidation to take place. If these three approve consolidation, Hampton and Coal Valley would join the super city if their voters approve the respective referenda.

The impetus for the consolidation has come from local business and community leaders who have been searching for strategies to arrest or reverse the region's continuing economic deterioration. The Illinois Quad-Cities region, once labeled the farm implement capital of the world, has never recovered from the recession of the early 1980s. The area's unemployment rate topped out at 22.2 percent in January 1983, and since then an additional 19,000 manufacturing jobs have been lost, most of them permanently. The manufacturing plant closings have been followed by small business failures, mortgage foreclosures and declining residential property values.

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Rock Island County Board of Realtors' figures, for example, indicate that the average selling price of a single-family home in the region fell 24.3 percent between 1981 and 1988. Adjusted for inflation, the decline in the value of residential real estate was 40.4 percent, or nearly 6 percent per year. A study by the Center for Governmental Studies at NIU showed that 75 percent of the region's residents felt that the economy of the area had worsened between 1983 and 1988, and that over 90 percent felt that it was no longer possible for young people to secure a good job in the region.

Consolidation of the five communities into a single city (which would be Illinois' fourth largest after Chicago, Rockford and Peoria) has been advanced as a strategy to reverse the decline and spur the region's economic recovery. Proponents of consolidation argue that consolidation would:

• Provide regional leadership for promoting economic development. A single source of decisionmaking could negotiate with economic development prospects on matters relating to available land, zoning, transportation and utility facilities, financial assistance, tax incentives and other economic development considerations.
• Unify the economic recovery efforts of the existing communities into a single, coordinated effort. Consolidation would eliminate economic competition between the existing communities, making it possible for the region to negotiate on more favorable terms with prospective developers.
• Provide local political leadership with greater influence in Springfield and Washington to help the area secure needed legal and financial assistance.
• Improve public services by reducing service costs through economies of scale.

Those opposing the consolidation assert that:

• There is no guarantee that consolidation would lead to improvements in the area's economy.
• Studies show that the area's residents believe that the existing units of local government are doing a good job providing public services.
• Consolidation would reduce citizen control over local government by decreasing the number of elected officials and greatly increasing the number of voters in each aldermanic ward.
• Consolidation might lead to higher taxes.

Early opposition to consolidation came from Moline. Moline Mayor Robert W. Anderson and members of the city council have argued that consolidation is unnecessary and that Moline would be hurt by it. The region's major shopping facilities are located in Moline, and the sales tax receipts from them have enabled Moline to keep other taxes down, especially in comparison with Rock Island and East Moline.

In the fall of 1987, the NIU center surveyed residents in the eight communities. Eighty-five percent of the respondents had heard of the consolidation proposal; of these, 63 percent felt they were very informed or somewhat informed about the matter. Among those with an opinion on the issue, proponents of consolidation outnumbered opponents by nearly 2-1. Support for consolidation was found most heavily among respondents in the larger cities, those who had more education and those with higher incomes. Opposition was more likely to be found among those who had lived in the area for the longest time and among union members. Neither race nor political party affiliation had a measurable effect upon support or opposition. The survey concluded that further development of a consolidation proposal was justified, and that extensive public education was needed.

After public hearings last winter when a number of alternative patterns of political and administrative organization were considered, the task force developed a proposed form of government for the consolidated super city: a 14-member city council, with 12 members elected from single-member wards and two elected at large; a full-time mayor elected at large who would chair the council, make administrative appointments subject to council confirmation, and provide leadership in the formation and approval of city policies; and a professional local government administrator who, as chief administrative officer, would recommend the appointment and removal of department heads, direct and supervise administrative operations, and advise the council and mayor on policy questions.

Last spring, the NIU center announced the results of an analysis of the tax and fiscal consequences of consolidation. Each elected municipal official in all eight communities was interviewed, and the cost of providing services in the super city was based on the assumption that each local service would be provided uniformly at the highest service level already provided by any of the eight communities. The costs of water, police, streets and code enforcement were estimated. Depending upon whether the existing average or highest level of efficiency is achieved, the cost of consolidating services ranged from a worst case — an increase of $335,500 — to a best case — saving of $4,294,000 per year. The study showed that most taxpayers would enjoy a net reduction in total tax burdens if the communites were consolidated. That holds for the eight communities in the region as well as the five voting on consolidation in November.

Despite all the studies and effort, odds do not favor consolidation. A defeat in one of the three major cities defeats the whole idea, and Moline's elected officials have vigorously opposed the merger and predict rejection in Moline by margins ranging from 10-1 to 2-1. A Quad-City Times poll released September 4 shows a slightly different picture. Moline residents were split: 38 percent in favor; 33 percent opposed, 29 percent undecided. Rock Island residents showed the greatest support: 46 percent in favor, 20 percent opposed, 34 percent undecided. East Moline showed the greatest opposition: 20 percent in favor; 46 percent opposed, 29 percent undecided.

While no one can guarantee that a consolidated government will resolve the regions' economic woes, rejection of it could be viewed by industrial developers as a sign that the Illinois Quad Cities are stuck in the past rather than willing to take a chance for the future.□

James M. Banovetz is director of the division of public administration at Northern Illinois University and is research fellow in NIU's Center for Governmental Studies. The center provided technical assistance to the task force throughout the development of the consolidation proposal.

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