Fishers’ Proposed ‘Sham City’ Goes to the Indiana Supreme Court

Steve Griesemer, a Geist resident, is the lead attorney representing the Fishers residents in their case against the Town of Fishers.

In 1990, the Town of Fishers was an exit off of I-69 with a McDonalds, gas station, and only 7,200 residents. Today, according to 2010 census data, the town has grown to 76,794 residents, growing nearly 10 times the size in just 20 years. In the Indianapolis metro area, Fishers is second in size behind the City of Carmel with 79,191 residents.

A group of Fishers residents think that it’s time for Fishers to change from a town form of government to a city. A group of residents, led by Joe Weingarten, led the charge to get over 1,700 Fishers residents to sign a petition to put the notion on the ballot in the form of a referendum last fall. Petitions were filed in May of 2010, and three days later the Fishers Town Council announced they were going to reorganize, buying them six months to propose an alternative plan.

In December 2010, the Town Council proposed and adopted their reorganization plan (click here), which on the surface seemed like a step in the right direction. However, buried in the details of the plan were some changes that take away the rights of voters to elect their own city mayor and self-appoints the current town council members as the city’s first council members. Residents are crying foul.

Weingarten, along with Mike Kole and Glenn Brown, took their grievances to the Indiana Supreme Court (download plaintiff’s brief). Local Geist resident Steve Greisemer, an attorney with Lewis & Kappes, PC, is representing the residents of Fishers.

“We would be perfectly fine with the reorganization plan,” said Greisemer, “if we only had the voting rights that came along with being a city. If this holds up, we’d be the only city in the State of Indiana that has a city council voted at large with an appointed mayor.”

The current town government structure allows for town council members to be voted in at large, and then those town council members nominate and choose the town council president. Currently Scott Faultless, a 16-year town council member, is the town council president. In a city form of government, according to Indiana Code 36-4-5-2 and 36-4-6-3(i), officials are elected by their own districts, not at large, and the mayor is then voted on by all the voters in the city. What the Town of Fishers is proposing is a “hybrid” style city where officials are still voted in the same way as they are now with the mayor being appointed by the city council. Fishers residents would not be able to elect their mayor, making the mayor accountable only to the town council. Further, the initial Fishers city council would appoint themselves as the first city council, giving residents absolutely no say in electing their first mayor.

A referendum is currently planned for the November elections. If the Town of Fishers has their way, two options for a city will be on the ballot: A traditional city versus the proposed hybrid city proposed by the Fishers Town Council. Petitioners feel this is confusing and will only dilute the vote. Either the traditional city or hybrid city must collect 50% plus one votes in order for either to carry.

“It’s ‘Sham City’,” said Joe Weingarten, one of the plaintiffs in the case and active organizer that collected many of the 1,700 signatures. “The Town of Fishers is doing everything they can to keep Scott Faultless in power.”

A verdict in the Indiana Supreme Court case (No. 94S00-1112-CQ-692) is likely to be handed down soon. (click here to watch the oral arguments online)