Governance conference draws five commissioners

Anyone looking for the Johnson County Commission on Thursday would do better to look in Wichita. The commission canceled its regular meeting scheduled for Thursday so five of its seven members could attend the annual conference of the Kansas Association of Counties.

Commissioners Michael Ashcraft, Steve Klika, Jason Osterhaus and Ron Shaffer and Commission Chairman Ed Eilert will go to the conference this week. Their absence, leaving only Commissioners Jim Allen and John Toplikar, means there won’t be a quorum for the regular Thursday meeting.

The Kansas Association of Counties is a quasi-public agency whose mission is to promote effective and responsive government, according to its website. The conference features workshops on such things as managing employee benefits and working with the state Department of Transportation.

Also among the offerings is a session on the legislative issues the group will be most concerned with when Kansas lawmakers return to Topeka.

Normally some commissioners attend at least part of the conference. But it doesn’t usually affect the quorum when the conference is held in Topeka or Overland Park because commissioners can drive back and forth, said Eilert.

The county pays registration, hotel and per diem expenses for their attendance. The commissioners, who have a car allowance, pay their own travel expenses. The estimated cost for the commissioners to attend this year is $3,400.

The legislative issues have caused a lot of interest in the conference this year, Eilert said, adding that there are a lot of open questions to be answered about the impact of a property tax lid to take effect in 2018. The new law, approved last session, prevents tax increases above the rate of inflation without a public vote.

The tax lid was approved as the session wound to a close but there are still items in it that may need to be addressed in the upcoming session, Eilert said. The timing of the election, for instance, is a quandary for local governments that must set their budgets by August to have them in place for the November property valuations and the mailing of the tax bills. “So when do you have an election?” Eilert said.

The exemptions also pose more questions, he said. Officials are unclear whether state-mandated increases in certain funds, such as employee retirement benefits, will be exempted. Eilert also pointed out that the current law exempts the fire districts from the tax lid, although their boards are appointed, not elected. “So do you have a non-elected board not subject to a public vote?”

There have been a number of recent legislative changes that affect cities and counties that Eilert said he’d be interested in at the conference. The county is still studying the potential impact in changes to the appeals process on property values, he said.

He also listed sales tax revenue projections and the mortgage registration fee as ongoing concerns affecting local governments. During the last legislative session, lawmakers raised the state sales tax but predictions on how that affects future revenue have been off.

Some commissioners commented on that during a recent update on the county’s financial report. Sales tax revenue to Johnson County was reported on target for this time of year.

Commissioner Steve Klika asked County Budget Director Scott Neufeld why the county sales tax revenue appeared strong while state projections were for a shortfall.

“We do not suffer from an overabundance of misplaced optimism when we do our budget,” Neufeld replied.

The county has also been at odds over the phase-out of the mortgage registration fee, charged during real estate closings. According to the report, the money coming in from the replacement for that fee is about $317,000 behind the estimate of where it should be by now. County Manager Hannes Zacharias pointed out that the county and state estimates on the phase-out’s impact differ from each other.

This story was originally published November 3, 2015 at 4:02 PM with the headline "Governance conference draws five commissioners."