The Reagan administration`s reduction in revenue sharing hit home in York Township Thursday as Supervisor John S. O`Brien proposed a 19 percent increase in the tax levy for fiscal 1987 to salvage senior citizen services.
The township is feeling the pressure of the erosion of federal funding for social programs and the rising costs of government services, electricity and water in Du Page County.
Because the township`s elderly residents want their favorite programs continued, O`Brien drafted a preliminary tax levy that would be $258,025 higher than this year`s $1.3 million.
Calling it ”a tight levy” that reflects personnel reductions and economies since he took office in 1985, O`Brien said it anticipates lower legal and capital improvement expenses. But he said it also reflects a complete or partial loss of federal revenue sharing funds, which Reagan administration officials and Congress have said will occur at the start of the federal government`s next fiscal year, Oct. 1.
Though the four township trustees are on record as supporting continuation of the meal and transportation programs for senior citizens, only Mark E. Larson displayed outright support for a 19 percent tax boost.
Township Trustee Virginia C. Grane said she is studying possible ways to maintain senior programs without a levy increase. York Township`s $1.4 billion assessed valuation is expected to rise by at least $50 million this year and that would produce about $50,000 more for the township in tax revenue, she said.
”There is no reason that the senior program should cause a tax increase, espcially a 19 percent one,” said Township Assessor Lester R. Swailes, who confirmed Grane`s figures. Swailes, who is at odds politically with fellow Republican O`Brien, argued that the township has reserve funds it could use instead of raising taxes. And he noted that O`Brien has suggested that for the second consecutive year there be no tax levy for the general assistance program, which provides residents with emergency aid.
”That is damn dangerous. If we had a big strike here, we wouldn`t have the money to help them.”
The York Township senior citizen hot meal program, serving about 150 people weekdays in the township hall and through deliveries to shut-ins, is in jeopardy because of the federal cuts.
William H. Wonnell, an official of the nonprofit Du Page Senior Citizens Council, which runs the countywide meal program in 15 locations and helps York Township with its program, said his group lost $7,500 in federal funding this year and just learned that it will lose $18,000 next year as the budget ax falls in Washington.
Township Trustee Clayton C. Moore, opposing any tax increase, said Wonnell`s group deals with three caterers in other parts of the county that can run the hot-meal program for less than York Township does through its own staff.
Wonnell said his group is paying York Township $2.15 per meal. O`Brien talked of raising that to $3.17, then dropped the asking price to $2.73. But with the reduction in federal funds the group can`t afford that, he said.
”We say $2.40 is tops,” he said, adding that that is about what his group pays the three caterers it uses for other locations.
People in the meal program are not required to pay if they can`t afford to, but there is a donation system in which the Du Page Senior Citizens Council recovers about $1.20 per meal from those who eat in the township hall and $1.40 from homebound recipients, Wonnell said.
On Thursday Township Trustee Thomas W. Fawell said that he will vote to continue the senior programs and the township`s senior center. ”If squeezed” he would support a tax increase, though he is still hoping to find a way to cut expenditures first, Fawell said.
O`Brien said the township loses money on each meal in the program and a lot more on what it sells to a church-affiliated group that runs adult-day care centers in two churches.
