Milton Township voters lean toward tax increase for mental health, disability services

A mere 206 votes have put a tax increase request in Milton Township on the cusp of approval.

On election night, results of a referendum bid to create a community mental health board at the township level remained too close to call.

With mail-in and provisional ballots still being counted, the most recent tallies released by the DuPage County clerk's office now show a slim majority of voters giving the nod to the funding request.

The measure has 8,477 "yes" votes, or nearly 51% of the total, compared to 8,271 against, or 49%, according to unofficial counts.

Mail-in ballots must be postmarked on or before Election Day and returned by April 20 to be included with the final results.

Of the latest numbers, mail-in votes were leaning heavily in favor of the effort to create a 708 board, a panel charged with distributing the funding to providers of disability, mental health and addiction services.

Referendum supporters who cast mail-in ballots outnumbered opponents who used that method by a margin of 709 votes.

If the results stand, the newly elected township supervisor, John Monino, would appoint seven to nine volunteer members to the mental health board.

Trustees also would get the final say on the amount residents would pay in additional taxes each year. But the request caps the tax levy for the mental health board at 0.15% of the assessed value of taxable property.

Bloomingdale Township created the first 708 board in DuPage County with voter approval in 2017. The Milton Township board would be the county's second.