Local Politics

[SubGod22]

Baby steps

KAKE - Kansas House unanimously adopts bipartisan bill cutting property, income and sales tax burden

Kansas House Democrats and Republicans joined forces Wednesday to unanimously approve a bipartisan bill slicing hundreds of millions annually in state income, sales and property taxes with an eye toward dodging a veto by Gov. Laura Kelly.

During debate on the package Tuesday evening, lawmakers affirmed reductions in income tax rates paid by earners in three brackets - a deliberate avoidance of the Kansas Senate GOP’s preference for a single-rate, flat-tax plan opposed by the Democratic governor. Kansans earning less than $7,000 would no longer pay state income tax, while people making $7,000 to $30,000 would see rates fall from 5.25% to 5.2% and those taking in more $30,000 would have their rate cut from 5.7% to 5.65%.

Under Senate Bill 300, the standard deduction on state income taxes would be raised 3% and tied to changes in the annual rate of inflation. Personal exemptions to state income tax would be elevated and linked to inflation, but with a two-year sunset to allow for adjustment if the economy faltered.

The state income tax on Social Security benefits would be eliminated starting in the 2024 tax year rather than phased out over four years per the original House bill. An amendment to the House bill would terminate the state’s 2% sales tax on food on July 1 instead of Jan. 1.

The legislation would lower the state’s property tax for K-12 public education from 20 mills to 18 mills. In addition, the residential exemption on this piece of state property tax would be raised from $40,000 to $100,000. The original version of the bill would have doubled that exemption to $80,000.

The bill endorsed 123-o by the House moves to the Kansas Senate, where its fate was uncertain. House Speaker Dan Hawkins, R-Wichita, urged Kelly to sign the bill if it reached her desk.

“I don’t know if you all are having the same feeling I am,” Hawkins said. “But I gotta tell you, I am really proud of the House of Representatives. Really amazing what happens when everybody works together. I don’t have any other words to say, except, thank you. You guys are awesome.”

In my mind, it's never enough, but I'll take small steps in the right direction. Hopefully the Senate doesn't **** this up.

[Atxshoxfan]

I don't live in Kansas anymore, but in my experience, property tax reductions are often followed by property appraisal increases to offset the loss of revenue.

[SubGod22]

I don't live in Kansas anymore, but in my experience, property tax reductions are often followed by property appraisal increases to offset the loss of revenue.

We've already seen those increases over the last few years. It's been beyond ridiculous

[WuDrWu]

That's a big part of the reason the state is running a surplus.

[SubGod22]

That's a big part of the reason the state is running a surplus.

A pretty massive surplus at that.

[Shockm]

That's a big part of the reason the state is running a surplus.

The Covid money which helped create the surplus is running out. That's one of the reasons that our (259) school district is having to "cut" so much money from the budget. The Covid money from Biden which he sent to the states and schools, (which created so much inflation) is running out, and now they have to pay for all of the extra facilities they built, and the teachers they hired, etc.

[SubGod22]

Here's another long overdue step in the right direction.

Kansas Reflector - Kansas Legislature brings gavel down on civil asset seizure powers of law enforcement

Last week, the Kansas Legislature voted 120-0 in the House and 35-0 in the Senate to send Gov. Laura Kelly a bill transforming the asset seizure statute. It was hailed by Republicans and Democrats, and by conservative special-interest groups, as a triumph against a law that distorted the justice system.

“This is a day many of us have been waiting for for seven years,” said Rep. Susan Humphries, a Wichita Republican and attorney who chairs the House Judiciary Committee. “There have been many meetings, hearings, interim committees, judicial council committees — a lot of work by many folks, including our dear colleague Gail Finney.”

Leawood Sen. Kellie Warren, an attorney and the GOP chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said the bill headed to Kelly’s desk should be considered a significant step in the incremental process of addressing imbalances in processing civil asset seizure and forfeiture cases.

“We found a good position to help bring guardrails to this system, to protect Kansans’ liberties — who were having their assets seized without the proper ability to raise a defense and get their seized property back,” she said.

Kansas Highway Patrol Col. Erik Smith, who worked at the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration for 20 years, warned legislators it would be folly to curtail seizure of illicit assets controlled by criminal enterprises given a majority of drug trafficking was associated with Mexican cartels and Chinese syndicates. Likewise, KBI director Tony Mattivi said special-interest groups inaccurately asserted Kansas civil asset forfeiture laws were deployed to coerce resources from innocent property owners. Mattivi said data didn’t support the conclusion law enforcement abused the system.

Sam MacRoberts, general counsel of Kansas Justice Institute, said the 30-year-old statute facilitated government overreach by financially incentivizing law enforcement agencies to strip property from innocent people.

This has been absolutely abused all over the country and innocent people end up being forced to spend thousands of dollars to get their property back even when never charged or found not guilty of the accusations made. Law enforcement makes millions every year doing this and a lot of it comes at the expense of poor, innocent people.

The legislation directed state courts to determine whether forfeitures sought by law enforcement was constitutionally excessive. The government’s attorney would have the burden of establishing with “clear and convincing evidence” the forfeiture was proportional to seriousness of the alleged offense associated with the forfeiture.

The bill would require the seizing law enforcement agency to forward to a county or district attorney a written request for the forfeiture within 14 days. Current law sets that clock at 45 days.

If a local prosecutor rejected the request, the law enforcement agency would have 14 days to seek intervention by a state law enforcement counsel or the attorney general’s office to defend a forfeiture action. If state assistance was declined, the seizing agency must return property to the owner within 30 days. The exception would be seized dangerous drugs or hazardous materials that would be destroyed rather than returned.

The bill would prevent the seizing agency from requesting, inducing or coercing a person who asserted rights as an owner or interest holder of property to waive, in writing, such property rights until forfeiture proceedings began.

Significantly, the legislation limited the ability of local and state law enforcement agencies to pass seizure cases to federal authorities, a tactic that made it more difficult for owners of property to challenge the taking. Federal attorneys could take the case if it involved a joint task force investigation or seizure; if property seized by an agency was subsequently linked to a federal warrant obtained from a federal court; if property seized related to a “serious public safety” concern; or if the gross estimated value of the property seized was in excess of $25,000.

In the future, the bill would require an affidavit describing probable cause supporting forfeiture to be filed. The seizure proceedings could begin only after a state judge determined there was legal cause to believe the property could be subject to forfeiture. The notice of a pending forfeiture action sent to the owner would have to include the affidavit.

Nothing here is unreasonable to expect from government/law enforcement.

Civil Rights matter.

I need to look into if the guy who had his classic car seized ever got it back. I believe it was seized because of some simple procedural error/miscommunication but it's been awhile and I can't recall it all. I know he was having to spend tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight to get it back and I think his only "crime" was having it tagged incorrectly or some such.

[SubGod22]

MSN - Marijuana pilot program scheduled for hearing in Kansas

A medical marijuana bill is set to get a hearing at the Kansas Statehouse. It’s the first hearing scheduled on a marijuana proposal this session.

Kansas lawmakers scheduled Senate Bill 555 for a hearing on Thursday, March 28 at 8 a.m. The bill is currently in the Senate Committee on Federal and State Affairs.

The proposal is backed by Kansas Natural Remedies, a hemp cultivator based in Wichita. It establishes a medical cannabis pilot program for limited cultivation, processing and dispensing of medical cannabis and medical cannabis products.

I doubt anything will come of this, but this is about as far as anything marijuana related has gotten in Kansas. I can't recall any legislation ever actually getting out of committee but I could be wrong about that.

[SubGod22]

Another Marion lawsuit

Eagle - Former Marion vice mayor sues over raid, claiming it was an effort to 'get rid of her'

The former vice mayor of Marion, Kansas, whose home was searched by police in August along with the local newspaper, filed a federal lawsuit against the city and a host of local officials and law enforcement officers on Tuesday, alleging they violated her First and Fourth Amendment rights.

Ruth Herbel, an 81-year-old former Marion City Council member, alleged in the lawsuit that former Mayor David Mayfield and his allies — including the former Police Chief Gideon Cody and Marion County Sheriff Jeff Soyez — orchestrated a conspiracy to get her out of office and silence her for criticizing Mayfield’s actions in the local newspaper, The Marion County Record.

The 88-page lawsuit comes nine months after the police raid, in which Marion’s then-Police Chief Gideon Cody led law enforcement officers on searches of the newspaper, the home of the paper’s editor and owner, as well as Herbel’s residence. The searches provoked a national outcry and Cody later resigned.

Before the searches, the Record had been investigating Cody’s tenure at the Kansas City Police Department, where he was facing possible disciplinary action for allegedly making sexist comments. In applying for the search warrants, Cody wrote that he was investigating alleged identity theft of local restaurant owner Kari Newell after a reporter looked up her driver’s license records— which are public records — on a state database. The search warrant application for Herbel closely matched those drafted for the Record’s office and the home of the Record’s editor and publisher, Eric Meyer.

Herbel’s lawsuit is the fifth lawsuit filed over the raid, which include suits brought by Record editor Eric Meyer, current and former Record reporters and the Record’s office manager. The legal challenges have shone a spotlight on Fourth Amendment rights in Kansas — and the numerous violations of constitutional rights by law enforcement statewide alleged over the past decade.

Herbel, through her attorneys, says in the lawsuit that Mayfield “instructed Chief Cody to open an investigation” into his administration’s chief critics — Herbel and the Marion County Record — with the goal of silencing political dissidents.

“Mayor Mayfield began enlisting his political allies into a conspiracy to remove Ruth from office. Their first attempts failed – a wildly unsuccessful recall attempt and a half-baked scheme to trick Ruth into agreeing she was an at-will employee,” Herbel’s lawsuit says. “Finally, Mayor Mayfield decided that charging Ruth with a crime was the only way to get rid of her.”

This article is obviously based off of Herbal and her lawyers telling, but that's because nobody else is talking. Even if things are slanted, the picture painted isn't pretty. Sounds like a lot of hostility was going on up there regardless of where the truth lies. And there was a lot of shady actions taking place between the mayor, chief of police, and the judge that signed off on the warrants.

[SubGod22]

Johnson County Post - Gov. Laura Kelly calls special session of Kansas Legislature to contend with tax-cut bill

Kelly, the second-term Democrat, proposed several tax plans to the Republican-led Legislature during the regular 2024 session and she vetoed three bills passed by the Legislature that would have shed more than $500 million annually in state revenue. A shifting coalition of GOP and Democratic legislators expressed interest in slashing taxes, while the governor held to the view Kansas should be careful not to invite budget problems reminiscent of what transpired after Gov. Sam Brownback signed a 2012 bill aggressively lowering the state income tax.

Kelly set the tone on tax policy in January by drop-kicking the Republican leadership’s tax-cut dream bill. Her latest move was to reject a $2.3 billion bill passed in May with bipartisan majorities. Throughout the legislative session, Kelly had worked with legislative leadership to use the state’s financial surplus to implement “robust” tax reform that was not “unsustainable” in the next three to five years.

House Speaker Dan Hawkins, a Wichita Republican, said a special session could have been avoided if the governor accepted “bipartisan, sustainable” tax bills adopted by the Legislature. He said the special session would cost an estimated $84,000 per day and complained the governor was playing “election-year political games” at the expense of Kansas taxpayers.

I know at least one of the vetoed bills had support from both sides. I'm always in favor of tax cuts but I also understand their need to make sure they still have enough income to operate and that seems to be where some of the concern is at. Though, one would think that with making Kansas more attractive with lower taxes (we're one of the higher taxed states in the country) to make us more competitive with our region would be a good thing, and could end up leading to more tax revenue down the road. I think it's the how far down the road that can be a concern. One would think with Panasonic and potentially Integra, as well as other businesses coming in, that more jobs and more businesses which leads to more spending would keep revenue in a good place. And if it does play out like that, we could see further tax cuts down the road.

The promising thing is both sides seem to be in favor of moving in this direction so there's some hope.

The state’s tax revenue forecasters reported in April that Kansas could end the current fiscal year June 30 with a surplus of $2.6 billion in the general treasury and $1.7 billion in a special rainy-day fund. Assuming state tax revenue was reduced next fiscal year by $530 million, the forecast said the state could end the upcoming fiscal year with $1.9 billion in the state’s general fund and $1.8 billion in the emergency account.

The special session was called during a summer season devoted to legislative candidates working toward the August primary election and the November general election. All 40 Senate and all 125 House seats are up for grabs in the 2024 election cycle.

A coalition of influential organizations, including the Kansas Farm Bureau, Kansas Chamber and about a dozen others, sent a letter to Kelly urging her to make a deal on meaningful tax reform. That coalition urged the governor to act on property and sales tax reforms even if a deal couldn’t be struck on income taxes.

It would be nice that if they can't come to terms on income tax that they at least address the others before this session concludes. Property tax definitely needs to be addressed.

[SubGod22]

Sounds like some good may come from the special session after all.

Tax cuts could save Kansans $1.2B over 3 years

Kansas’ Democratic governor and top Republican lawmakers say they have an agreement on a package of broad tax cuts, potentially ending a two-year political standoff that has prevented their state from following others in making big reductions.

The deal announced late Thursday by Gov. Laura Kelly and GOP leaders would save taxpayers a total of about $1.2 billion over the next three years and move Kansas from three personal income tax rates to two, something Kelly had resisted. Republican leaders had hoped for income and property tax cuts worth at least $230 million more over the next three years, rejecting Kelly’s argument that larger cuts would lead to budget shortfalls within five years.

Lawmakers are set to convene a special session Tuesday, called by Kelly after she vetoed the last of three tax plans approved by the Legislature before it ended its regular annual session May 1.

It's something

Kelly said the deal is “not without its flaws.” Both she and GOP leaders noted that it would provide a significantly lower property tax cut than previous plans.

Homeowners and businesses are paying more because overall property values in Kansas jumped more than 26% from 2019 through 2023, according to state Department of Revenue figures. Residential property values rose even faster, nearly 41%.

Most property taxes in Kansas are imposed locally, but the state has a small levy to help finance public schools. The owner of a $250,000 home now pays $478 a year in taxes because of that levy, and the latest tax plan would reduce that by $76 a year or 15.6%.

But the last plan Kelly vetoed would have cut the tax on that same $250,000 home by $142 a year or nearly 30%, and some lawmakers thought that wasn’t enough.

Again, it's something.

Sen. Tom Holland, a Democrat from northeastern Kansas, outlined a tax plan Wednesday that would sacrifice some income tax cuts to bump up the property tax cut to $212 for a $250,000 home or 44%, while also providing a smaller reduction for businesses and farmers. On Friday, he called the latest plan “a nothingburger.”

“It just doesn’t provide the property tax relief that Kansans have been begging for,” he said.

However, it wasn’t clear Friday that objections to the plan would be strong enough to sink it. Legislative leaders hoped to finish the special session in a single, long day and lawmakers worry that voters will punish them in this year’s elections if there are no major tax cuts. Both factors put pressure on rank-and-file lawmakers to fall in line.

“This agreement is an important first step that lowers taxes today for the people who need it the most,” top Republican leaders said in a joint statement Thursday night.

I don't think we'll ever get the tax relief we want, but I'll take what I can get.

Looks like the plan will eliminate state income tax on Social Security benefits.

The 2% tax on groceries will remain until January 1. Kelly had wanted to move that up to July 1. Not sure what the issue there is, but at least it will go away.

[SubGod22]

KWCH - Tax bill passes 34-4 in Kansas senate

The Kansas tax bill compromise passed 34-4 in the state Senate on Tuesday and now moves on to the Kansas House of Representatives.

The deal announced late Thursday by Gov. Laura Kelly and GOP leaders would save taxpayers a total of about $1.2 billion over the next three years and move Kansas from three personal income tax rates to two, something Kelly had resisted, according to the Associated Press.

Besides moving Kansas from three personal income tax rates to two, it would reduce the highest rate from 5.7 percent to 5.58 percent while also exempting more income from the tax to help lower-income taxpayers, the AP said. It would eliminate state income taxes on Social Security benefits, which kick in when retirees earn $75,000 a year, and expand an income tax credit for child care expenses.

I'd expect similar results in the House.

[SubGod22]

KAKE - Kansas lawmakers have passed tax cuts to clear the way for a plan to lure the Chiefs

But top Republicans in the GOP-controlled Legislature promised that the stadium proposal wouldn't be debated until the Legislature approved a plan that would cut income and property taxes by a total of $1.23 billion over the next three years. Many lawmakers argued that voters would be angry if the state helped finance new stadiums without cutting taxes.

“We definitely need to demonstrate that we’re getting relief to our citizens,” said Senate President Ty Masterson, a Wichita-area Republican who backed the stadium-financing plan.

Democratic Gov. Laura Kelly called the special session to have lawmakers consider reducing taxes after she vetoed three tax-cutting plans before legislators adjourned their regular annual session May 1. The plan lawmakers approved was a compromise between her and Republican leaders.

Legislators made no changes in the plan before passing it, 34-4 in the Senate and 121-2 in the House. Kelly pledged to sign the measure into law.

Once legislators convened the special session, Kelly couldn't control what they considered, and that created an opening to consider the stadium-financing plan. That measure would use revenues from sports betting, the state lottery and new taxes raised from the area around each new stadium to pay off the state's bonds over 30 years.

The first version of the stadium-financing plan emerged in late April, but lawmakers didn't vote on it before adjourning. It would have allowed state bonds to finance all stadium construction costs, but the version to be considered by lawmakers Tuesday would cap the amount at 70% and require legislative leaders and the governor to sign off on any bonding plan.

House Commerce Committee Chair Sean Tarwater, a Kansas City-area Republican, said the Chiefs are likely to spend between $500 million and $700 million in private funds on a new stadium.

[SubGod22]

MSN - Governor signs bills for tax cuts and luring Chiefs, Royals

Kansas Gov. Laura Kelly has signed legislation to provide tax cuts for Kansans.

The Kansas Legislature voted on Tuesday to pass the tax cut bill, which cuts income and property taxes by $1.23 billion over the next three years. The bill also eliminates the state tax on Social Security income and increases the standard deduction and Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit.
.....
Kelly also announced she signed the bill to lure the Kansas City Chiefs and Major League Baseball’s Kansas City Royals away from Missouri. The legislature approved the measure Tuesday to authorize STAR bonds to help finance new stadiums and practice facilities for both teams on the Kansas side of the metropolitan area. The teams say they look forward to considering Kansas options.

[SubGod22]

This is interesting.

KSN - 'Love, Kansas' asks former state residents to come home

Top leaders of the Sunflower State gathered in Manhattan on Monday to unveil a new campaign aiming to bring former Kansas residents back to their home state.

Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of the Kansas Department of Commerce (KDC) David Toland, along with other leaders from around the state, announced the implementation of the “Love, Kansas” talent attraction campaign on July 1. The program aims to invite past residents to return to Kansas to fill local job opportunities and live in one of the state’s many communities.

“It’s simple: We need more humans in Kansas to keep up with the phenomenal economic growth our state is experiencing,” Lieutenant Governor and Secretary of Commerce David Toland said. “The best way to do that is to first approach Kansans who left the state for economic opportunities elsewhere and invite them to build a life in a place they know and have connections to, whether in their hometown or elsewhere in the state. And with the Love, Kansas campaign, we aren’t just extending an invitation to those who once called Kansas home to come back – we’re also inviting families from around the country to build their lives in the Sunflower State.”

I'd love to see a follow up in a year or two to see if this works at all and on what level.

I could see some appeal for those who have left for job opportunities but maybe have family here. There are definitely areas where there has been economic growth and open jobs and that will increase over the next handful of years or so as more businesses open and expand.