Jackson County homeowners could be closer to getting tax money back per new order
Interim Jackson County Executive Phil LeVota has spent the first half of his 14-month role proposing a series of controversial tax programs intended to offset residents’ climbing property tax bills.
Now, he has leveraged the powers of the county executive position behind the proposed policies, while a trio of lawsuits against the county continue to play out.
LeVota signed an executive order Friday directing county staff to implement three years of tax credits to reimburse residential property owners whose assessed property values rose by more than 15% in 2023.
The program targets 2023 property tax payments and promises direct relief, using money that has already been distributed to and spent by taxing districts including Jackson County cities, schools and libraries.
LeVota signed the executive order on July 4, while all of Jackson County’s municipal government offices were closed for the holiday.
The Jackson County charter specifically empowers the county executive to issue executive orders that establish “systems of administrative order in the departments” he oversees.
LeVota released a three-and-a-half minute video message regarding the executive order, telling residents not to “be confused by anyone questioning the legality of this action.” He referred, as during previous tax actions, to a clause in the Jackson County charter, which empowers the county executive to correct errors in assessment and tax records.
“Correcting those errors means more than simply changing numbers in a database,” LeVota said. “It also means making taxpayers whole.”
Under LeVota’s policies, the first set of tax credits would appear on residents’ bills in 2027, several months after his temporary term elapses.
Previously, LeVota enacted a retroactive, artificial cap on the values of commercial properties whose values went up over 15% in 2025, a process completed by manually reviewing more than six thousand commercial properties that had been valued under $5 million in 2023.
Last year, he instructed commercial property owners to “estimate what (their) tax bill is” and pay their guess to the county while they waited for assessment staff to adjust their bills to the new 2025 values.
Tax legislation stalls
The executive order followed several weeks of activity in which LeVota threw support behind a legislative ordinance that would have given his tax policies more permanence ahead of his exit.
In early June, Legislative Vice Chair Sean Smith sponsored an ordinance that would write LeVota’s tax policies into the Jackson County code, at LeVota’s request. The ordinance would make the tax policies more difficult to reverse after LeVota leaves office on January 1.
So far, the Jackson County Legislature has held the ordinance in committee and declined to conduct a final vote. In Friday’s video message, LeVota encouraged the Jackson County Legislature to “follow his lead” and move forward with the ordinance.
“I’m disappointed to hear some legislators and some candidates for county executive oppose this plan or even support eliminating these tax credits without offering an alternative,” LeVota said.
Multiple candidates for Jackson County executive have criticized LeVota’s tax policies, including current Legislative Chair Manny Abarca, who said at a June forum that LeVota was “withholding information” from the legislature on the extent of overtaxation the county still needs to address.
Candidate Ryan Meyer has also been a vocal opponent of the tax policies, pledging to reverse them quickly if elected. Under the charter, LeVota’s order — or any executive order from a sitting county executive — can be reversed by an overriding order from their successor, or by legislative vote or court order.
Jackson County is currently facing multiple lawsuits regarding the last several property tax assessment cycles and LeVota’s proposed abatements, now backed by executive order. Two hundred thousand residents are eligible for a class action lawsuit seeking direct refunds of 2023 tax payments, while two school districts sued LeVota and other county officials on June 16, arguing that his tax plans rely on “clawing back” funds already spent by the districts.
Representatives from Kansas City and Lee’s Summit and the Kansas City and Mid-Continent public library systems spoke at a legislative hearing last week, arguing that the tax credit program could destabilize their budgets and erode or eliminate essential public services.
Meanwhile, the county is still embroiled in a legal dispute with the Missouri State Tax Commission over the 2023 and 2024 tax cycles. The lawsuit focuses on communication and procedural issues, alleging that Jackson County did not follow the proper legal steps before raising home values by upwards of 15% per parcel.
