Dear editor,
With the Kansas Legislature’s 2024 session set to begin in two weeks, I encourage readers to ask our state lawmakers and governor’s office to reinstate Local Ad Valorem Tax Reduction (LAVTR) Fund payments to local governments and restore a partnership started nearly a century ago and broken by the Legislature 20 years ago.
This time-tested partnership — started in 1937 and cancelled in 2003 — provides dollar for dollar reductions in property tax bills for county taxpayers. It is collected from sales taxes paid locally, and the partnership called for the monies to be sent to the state but returned to local governments based on a formula derived from population and valuation of local taxing entities.
In 2003, lawmakers, facing a state budget crunch, began withholding the statutorily mandated LAVTR by means of a committee vote to ignore the law when working the state budget and keep the money. That practice has continued the past 20 years, and legally-owed LAVTR funds amounting to $1.7 billion has not been returned to counties to provide property tax relief. That means our residents in all 105 counties have paid these tax monies twice — first in sales taxes and then again in property taxes that should have been refunded to local governments and returned to them in the form of reduced tax rates to operate our governments.
In budget year 2023, Allen County should have received $529,100 in LAVTR funds withheld by the state. That equaled 3.225 mills, based on our valuation then of $164,072, that would have been reflected in our budget as direct tax relief.
That was the intention of the partnership between the state and local governments established in ’37, codified as state law and circumvented for the past 20 years by legislators. I will be asking my local legislators to restore that partnership.
Moreover, the Legislature also has withheld City County Revenue Sharing (CCRS) Fund monies from local governments. That was established in 1978 to return a percentage of cigarette and liquor taxes collected locally and sent to the state. The Legislature has broken this contract since 2001, costing local governments more than $1.35 billion. Also, the Special City County Highway Fund (SCCHF) is another legally owed amount of money Kansas lawmakers have not paid since 2001. Collected by counties from property tax on motor vehicles, it is used to keep city streets and county roads in good shape. Lost revenue by local governments has totaled more than $412 million, again because state legislators have reneged on that partnership.
All told, these broken promises by the legislators — this breach of the partnership between state and local governments — have totaled nearly $3.5 billion over the past two decades. In 2022 alone, counties and cities lost out on $250 million: $128 million-plus in LAVTR; nearly $100 million in CCRS; and $22 million in SCCHF.
If you care about this lost money and would like to see the partnership between state and local governments restored in the upcoming legislative session in Topeka, please tell Rep. Dr. Fred Gardner, Sen. Caryn Tyson and Gov. Laura Kelly. State tax reform will be a big issue when the session starts Jan. 9, and Kansas has a large budget surplus that can help in these matters. The Kansas Association of Counties and Kansas League of Municipalities are using this upcoming session — which is followed by an election in November 2024 that will decide all 165 seats in the Legislature — to mount a major effort to restore these partnerships and return the tax dollars to local governments.
Please tell our representatives and senators they need to keep their promises regarding LAVTR and other local government funding because you as taxpaying Kansans are paying the price for these broken commitments. Urge them to start again paying those dollars in 2024. I certainly will communicate with my legislators and watch how they vote.
Addresses are: Sen. Caryn Tyson, Phone: 785-296-6838; email: [email protected]; home address, P.O. Box 191, Parker, KS, 66072.
Rep. Dr. Fred Gardner, Phone: 785 296-7451; email: [email protected] and [email protected]; home address, PO Box 275, Garnett, KS 66032.
Also, Gov. Laura Kelly, Capitol, 300 SW 10th Ave., Ste. 241S, Topeka, KS 66612-1590,
Sincerely, Bruce Symes
Iola, Kan.
