YOUR VOICE, YOUR VOTE: Tracking St. Joseph County Council primary elections
ST. JOSEPH COUNTY, Ind. -- There's a divide between former council president Dan Shaetzle, who's been found "not in good standing" by the party, and some other Republicans, including his primary challenger, Jamie O'Brien.
ABC57's Julianne Grohowski is covering several GOP races for St. Joseph County Council seats.
It's a heated race for District C and a big part of it comes down to council dynamics. Schaetzle has been termed as a Republican "not in good standing" by fellow councilmembers.
O'Brien says he wants to replace Schaetzle in order to bring back GOP initiatives that align with the wants and needs of residents in that district whereas Schaetzle says it’s time to move on from the council infighting and get to what really matters.
The two biggest topics for these two candidates? Property taxes and data centers, especially with the Microsoft data center taking shape in district C right now.
Here’s what they both had to say on data centers:
Schaetzle stated, “Every concern of our citizens that we’ve taken to Microsoft, they have responded positively to. So, that is very important. They’re capping the wells, they’re going to follow the noise ordinance, they’re paying their full tax bill which is going to be huge in helping us to continue to provide good services, improved services like snow plowing which we didn’t do real well on last year. It’s going to help our school; there are a lot of positives there.”
O'Brien said, "Some data centers are necessary; I’m suggesting Granger is not the right location. The residents of Granger suggested that as well in 2023 and 2024. If someone is looking to purchase a home, and there’s a home half a mile from the data center and a comparable home in Clay Township, the Clay Township home may well be more valuable because of the perception of what’s going to happen being so close to a data center.”
Taking a closer look at that district B GOP race, it's Amy Drake versus Matt Clayton, the incumbent versus a local lieutenant firefighter.
You might be wondering why a firefighter with no previous political experience felt compelled to run in this race. He says it all comes down to property taxes.
As a resident in the county, Clayton says he was hearing from countless neighbors that they felt taxed out of their homes after receiving last year's overinflated assessments.
As councilman, he says he would utilize Hoosier laws that prioritize property tax cuts for residents but still leave room for money in the county budget.
Drake on the other hand has the same priority after hearing outcry in Clay Township over the last five years.
She was part of an initiative to pass a tax cut for residents 55 and older, as well as advancing an affordability agenda to allow further tax breaks for first-time home buyers and seniors on limited income.
Here's what they both had to say about property taxes:
Clayton said, "One of the things that could have been done in the past is there was a law that allowed us to give property tax rebate checks or credits out of any surpluses the county had, that started in 2023. In 2023, there was a $27 million surplus, if that would have happened, then residents of Saint Joseph County would have received a 60 percent reduction on their St. Jospeh County taxes, their property taxes, and the county would have still had an additional $7 million to work with to work on infrastructure, replace plow trucks, whatever else they needed to do."
Drake said, "People just want us to cut their property taxes and as a county council we don't have that power, a lot of those powers rest with the state. So, when we can take action, we do, but that means there has to be something the state is allowing us to do, so maybe a lot they passed that we can take advantage of and that's something we did with the 55 and older tax cut. Another thing we tried to do but failed to do was to pass a Senior Stay in their Home Bill."