 |
| BY GREG WALTERS |
Last
Tuesday night the Board of Aldermen set aside $20,000 for use by the Truman
Heartland Foundation to aid homeowner efforts to cleanup up code violations on
their property. The Board passed a similar resolution creating the grants last
year.
Ward 4
Alderman Bill VanBuskirk asked how much of last year’s $20.000 had been spent. He
was surprised that not one cent of the money had been spent.
VanBuskirk
is not opposed to the donation. In fact, he has voted for the last two years.
But he does believe that if the city is sincere about cleaning up
neighborhoods, then the city should target those areas where the money is
needed and use it.
It is
important to note the $20,000 is set aside for those who cannot afford to clean
up their own property. As an example, years ago, when I served on the Board of
Alderman, I learned of a 90 year old widow whose property was damaged by a
windstorm. A tree had been blown down, crushing her fence and hanging out into
the right of way of 59th Street.
I
learned the city was planning on fining her for cleaning up the mess on the
street. After some short meetings with the powers that be a city hall, it was
decided the city would clean up the mess without charge.
The $20,000
package the Board passed last night would be for similar situations.
VanBuskirk
said, “I cannot understand why this is not being taken advantage of . . . we
all know of people in situations that need help . . . we should reach out and
offer this service to them.”
The
Ward 4 Alderman also explained the Truman Heartland Foundation’s role is not
just to hand out $20,000. The Foundation also coordinates and actively looks
for volunteers to help keep expenses in check.
After
the work is done, the city is billed for any expenses.
Last
year there were not expenses . . . so the city did not spend any taxpayer money
on any particular project.
VanBuskirk
says he intends, “to keep an eye open for opportunities of true need” so that
the money will be spent as was approved by the Board.
Last
Minute Change to
August and November Ballots
State lawmakers
were busy in the final days of their session this year. In the last two weeks
of the 2018 Session the Senate and House added a ballot issue to the August 8th
Primary and added a gasoline tax increase question to the November 2018 Ballot.
Right to Work Refendum
Voters
will choose to vote in favor or opposition to Right to Work Legislation passed
by the General Assembly last year. The ballot question was added to the August
8th Primary Election, The referendum is the result of a petition
drive to allow voters to have the final say on the Right to Work question.
10 Cent Gasoline Tax Increase
Slated for November Ballot
2018
may prove to be a record breaker for tax proposals on many Missouri ballots.
Raytown is no exception. Last week the State Legislature voted to put a 10 cent
per gallon gasoline tax on the November, 2018 ballot for voters to decide.
Raytown
voters will also be voting on a 2 cent per gallon local gasoline tax in August
of 2018. State lawmakers had asked Missouri municipalities to hold off on placing
fuel tax questions on the August ballot because of plans for the 10 cent tax increase
in November.
Parks and Recreation News
NEW FOUNTAIN
FOR KENAGY PARK
FOR KENAGY PARK
Raytown
Parks and Recreation moved forward with planned improvements at this past week.
A new aeration fountain has been placed in the pond located at Kenagy Park. By
circulating the water the fountain helps to keep down the growth of algae in
the pond.
Summer
Family Concert Series
 |
| INTERMISSION TIME AT THE FIRST OF FIVE CONCERTS PLANNED FOR RAYTOWN THIS SUMMER. |
Anna Lee
and The Lucky So and So’s performed for two hours, treating listeners to their
renditions of music from the 1940’s and 1950’. Anna Lee provided the vocals,
accompanied by a lively mix of horns and guitars.
The
Raytown Live Summer Family Concert Series has scheduled four more concerts. All
the concerts are to be held at the Green Space located near 63rd Street
and Raytown Road. All concerts begin at 6:00 p.m. and end at 8:00 p.m. The
following schedule is planned for the series.
June
9th . . . . . . Marty and Gary
July
14th . . . . . . The Jerry Hooper Band
August
11th . . . .To be announced
September
8th. . Nick Schnebelen
Raytown
Board of Aldermen Meeting – May 15, 2018
Missy Wilson told the
Board the Sales Tax Oversight Committee is required to report to the Board
annually. For more information, to go http://www.raytown.mo.us/vertical/Sites/%7B3A1DBD03-39C2-43FA-8CC9-95B16E6438CB%7D/uploads/05-15-18_Web_Packet(1).pdf and start on page 9.
Ray Haydaripoor told the Board some of the code violations his
department looks for are tall grass, junk, trash or debris, unlicensed or
inoperable vehicles or dangerous trees, peeling paint, roof or driveway in
disrepair. The Animal Control department
looks for animals running at large, sick or injured animals, dead animals,
cruelty investigations, animal attacks or barking dogs. For more information, click on http://raytownmo.swagit.com/play/05162018-1497 and go
to Study Session.
The Board passed a
resolution approving the appointment of Loretha Hayden to the Raytown Park Board.
The Board passed a
resolution approving an agreement with TrumanHeritage Habitat for Humanity for
the operation of a minor home repair program in an amount not to exceed
$20,000. The Agreement proposed would enable the City of Raytown to partner
with the Truman Heritage Habitat for Humanity to implement a minor home repair
program. The implementation of the minor home repair program would provide
another ‘tool’ for the Community Development Department to use as part of the
city’s neighborhood improvement program. The program would provide assistance
to low-moderate income homeowners who are financially unable to correct the
following types of property maintenance code violations on their property.
•
Exterior Painting;
• Roof
Repair and Replacement;
•
Repair Decks and Porches;
•
Repair Driveways;
•
Repair and Replace Flashing and Guttering;
•
Repair and Replace Siding;
• Tree
Trimming for House Safety; and
• Yard
Cleanup.
Homeowners needing to
make repairs to address City code violations would be informed of the
availability of this program by the Community Development Department when
discussing the specific code violations listed above. Homeowners expressing an
interest in this program would be referred to staff at Truman Heritage Habitat
for Humanity who is experienced working with homeowners to meet their needs.
Homeowners meeting the required criteria will be required to repay the cost of
the repairs by making a small monthly payment, which would be collected by the
Truman Heritage Habitat for Humanity. Loans would be at zero percent interest
for a period of up to seven years. The funds collected would then be placed in
a Raytown Minor Home Repair Account for future use in this program. The
proposed program would use volunteers from local churches and other
organizations to lower labor costs. A construction supervisor from Truman
Heritage Habitat for Humanity would manage each project and supervise
volunteers. Alderman Bill Van Buskirk
asked how much was spent last year. He
was told the homeowners who applied for assistance had more repairs than the
$2,000 limit would cover. Therefore, no
assistance was given.
The Board passed a
resolution amending the fiscal year 2017-2018 budget related to the Police Department.
The Police Department seeks to reallocate underutilized funds in the current
approved budget for training expenses of new employees. In order to staff open
positions within the Department, non-certified future employees will need to
attend the police academy. There are also pre-employment expenses associated
with the hiring process for both sworn and civilian personnel. The PD is
seeking to fill 4 sworn officer vacancies and 2 civilian vacancies within the
Fiscal Year 2017-2018. Total expense for hiring and academy training of 4
officers is $26,800.00 Total expense for hiring 3 civilian positions $2,100.00
Combined total $28,900.The IT expenses can be absorbed into the Police
Department’s Fiscal Year 2017-2018 operating budget with the reallocation of
funds from Unemployment line item to the Education and Training line item. These expenses are for IT network support for
the remainder of the 2017-2018 Fiscal Year, and the renewal of two maintenance
agreements for network backup software and server virtualization. The combined
total is $71,000.00 and these expenses can be absorbed into the Police
Department’s Fiscal Year 2017-2018 operating with the reallocation of funds
from the Unemployment line item to the Computer Services line item. This
transfer will leave approximately $14,000.00 in the Unemployment line item.
The Board passed a
resolution authorizing an expenditure of funds with MDLTechnology for
information technology-related services in an amount not to exceed $56,000 for
fiscal year 2017-2018. In 2013, the
Board of Aldermen approved a three-year agreement guaranteeing service pricing
for three years, approved annually, with MDL Technology, LLC to manage the IT
services of the Police Department. The agreed upon service plan is a monthly
fee of $80.00 per workstation and $400.00 per server. The agreement was renewed
in Fiscal Year 2015-2016 for an additional three years with no increase in
service cost.
To leave a comment use this link POST A COMMENT
To leave a comment use this link POST A COMMENT
69 comments:
Another school shooting has occurred.
Please explain how you can live with your child for 15 or 17 or 19 years and you do not realize they are depressed or mentally ill or stockpiling weapons?
Don't parents talk to their kids these days?
Inspect their rooms and social media accounts so you know what's going on and can get them help.
I added up the annual cost of the proposed taxes on the August and November ballots. They are:
City Gasoline Tax
State Gasoline Tax
City Property Tax on home and vehicles
City Tax on internet sales
I came up with increased taxes of over $500 annually!
I will not be voting for any of those tax increases. The city will just have to get by on what it makes. Just like we do at my household.
To anonymous May 21, 2018 at 7:12 AM the property tax increase for my place is about 80 dollars, the city gas tax, less than 20 cents a tank, so if you fill up once a week about 10 dollars a year. The city internet sales tax, well that depends on how much you shop on line instead of local brick and mortar stores. To your point of the city will have to get by on what it makes like a household, well many households increase their income when they realize they need to, if a person is on a "fixed" or retirement income there is some cost of living in that. The infrastructure is aging and roads need repair, drive down 79th, the pot holes and patches could use fixing. The city can't sustain and do repairs on the aging infrastructure with the income it has, and the city hasn't asked for voters to increase their income for awhile, so maybe for the good of the community it's time we give them some money to work with. Not to judge your spending but, you must either have a real expensive house and large vehicles and do a lot of shopping on line to get to a 500 dollar increase, in taxes, me, I'm willing to give some extra money to the city for the good of the whole city. I'll be keeping an eye on what the city does with it and voting accordingly in the elections also. If we want good roads and a well staffed PD we need to give the city something to work with.
@7:12am
You must own a lot of property or you have no math skills. Which one is it?
I will vote for the taxes locally, to care care of our immediate needs. I will not vote for the 10 cent fuel tax in November.
All of a sudden vanbuskirk is a budgetary watchdog?
There is also a new tax going on the August ballot at the county level for seniors.
My developer is trying to persuade me to move to .net from PHP.
I have always disliked the idea because of the costs.
But he's tryiong none the less. I've been using
Movable-type on a number of websites for about a year and am worried about switching to another platform.
I have heard excellent things about blogengine.net. Is
there a way I can transfer all my wordpress posts into it?
Any help would be really appreciated!
In my opinion the $20,000 Truman Heritage Habitat for Humanity funding is unused
1) because people are unaware it is there to apply for.
2) the $2000 limit rules them out since most repairs will be over $2000
3) It is actually a 7 year loan and people may be reluctant to go into debt.
4) People may not qualify for the program.
Andy Whiteman
6:19 AM, You must be kidding! I feel that way too but long ago I discovered that many parents do NOT supervise their children. I had a neighbor with 3 children, 2 of which were in High School and totally unsupervised. I complained to the mother about high, pounding bass from both the house and the boys' car. The mother told me not to speak to her so I mailed her a letter. She came to my door screaming that she did not have time to supervise her children because she had to work 3 jobs! She said her boyfriend was an attorney and threatened to get an "exparte" order against me! The boys were not in RHS durign school hours and out with friends. Since then the city of Raytown has initiated a daytime curfew. Hopefully that has resolved the issue in Raytown.
Maybe more jurisdictions need laws holding parents criminally responsible for the actions of their children.
Andy Whiteman
You guys don't pay attention do you? No money was distributed for home repairs last year because the cost of repairs were greater than the $2,000 limit and the homeowners didn't have the means to make up the difference. Maybe they need up increase the limit in order to actually do some good.
Correct me if I am wrong but I was under the impression that the state gasoline tax is to be faxed
in over 4 years, 2 and 1/2 cent per year.
You all continue to vote no and that city will die a slow death. Things don’t cost the same that they did 5,10 or 20 years ago. Your salaries have gone up, I’m sure.
We are already dying a slow death and we have one if not the highest tax rate in the metro. Wake up man
It is very clear many people are not reading the details on the utility bills. Electric, Natural Gas, telephone (both land lines and cell phones), internet service and your cable television, are taxed from 5% to 8%. Each time re all taxed at a high rate of 8%. Each time your utility bill goes up, the profit from the tax goes up with it.
It is really that simple.
Some of the "I will vote for any tax at any cost" folks will tell you the city has not had an increase in five, ten or even twenty years are lying to you. The percentage may not have gone up. But the take from the taxpayers has skyrocketed.
The answer to Raytown's problems is better management at city hall.
Read the Paul Livius Report. The police found close to $100,000 they had set aside for unemployment claims. But there were not any unemployment claims because those police who left (none were fired or laid off) did not file for unemployment.
Why? Because they had already applied for and many of them, been guaranteed jobs in Kansas City. Many of those officers said they were leaving during public comments at open meetings of the BOA.
So why did the police set aside nearly $100,000 for unemployment benefits they knew they were not going to need?
It is time to stop the silly shell games being played at city hall with our tax dollars.
Another example is the $20,000 set aside to help people clean up their property. Not one penny was spent last year! Give me a break. I can drive one mile in any direction from any point in Raytown and show where that money could have been put to good use.
The problem in Raytown is not a shortage of tax dollars. It is a shortage of honesty and simple taking care of business at city hall.
So why set aside the money for unem
I will be voting YES so I have adequate services and roads that aren’t gravel
Turn on your spam filter, lol. Amateur hour...
6:28 pm
Nice post, but only tells half the story. You see, the budget process begins long before it is adopted. At the time, it appeared that people were going to laid off. The responsible thing to do is to set aside funding for their unemployment instead of NOT planning for it and coming back months later asking for $100k. Many people unexpectedly resigned instead making that money available for something else. Good fiscal planning on the police department’s behalf, honest and taking care of business at city hall.
Citizens for the Truth in Raytown
I want a single trash service for the city. Less wear and tear on our roads, that we cannot afford to repair unless taxes are passed. Also, they include large item pick up and recycling. Win-win to me.
Posing a question because I don’t know. Is there any legal way to reduce the amount of tax that the school district and fire department gets? Just asking, maybe it’s not possible and we’ll have to live with our mistakes of overfunding those two entities.
Actually it was well known that a good number of police officers had put in for employment with other departments. How did we know this? Simple. They came to public meetings as early as May of 2017 and expressed their intention to leave to go to other departments. There was not an clever planning by city hall or the police department on this item. It never came up for discussion.
It does make me wonder what other money is squirreled away up at city hall.
Do you ever wonder about those seven or eight vacant positions on the department? They are vacant because the positions have not been filled. You never hear of them discussed as unfunded, just vacant.
Honest and taking care of business? What a joke!
Speaking of taking care of business at city hall. We just passed the one year anniversary of the BOA voting to install GPS on police cars. Anyone know if they have gotten around to it yet?
I doubt it. Despite all the hoopla of the last year it is very clear nothing has changed at city hall. They are back to protecting the status quo and taking care of number one.
Meanwhile, good legislation that would have helped people in need is allowed to go unspent. Like the $20,000 that was budgeted for last year and now for this year. Guess the Board forgot it was there to use. Guess the police are unaware of anyone in need.
Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker was named as special prosecutor in the Gov. Greitens’ case. Let’s see the Democrats work their dirty politics again
good thing Ryan Myers delayed the tax votes until later this year. gas prices will be through the roof by then and nobody will want to increase the gas tax
8:26 PM, There sure is! It is to VOTE: "NO" when the question appears on the ballot! But the NO votes will never prevail because in the case of the school district, "It is for the children." Both districts usually state the tax increase as a small amount of $XX.xx on a home valued at $100,000. How many homes are valued at only $100,000? People are easily fooled! Also people who don't own property vote YES because they don't pay property taxes, hence, don't give a damn.
Andy Whiteman
The budget issue didn’t come to light until September. Review the boa tapes if you don’t believe me. I verified it. Anything else is a lie.
We have a chance to right the ship now. Take action in the ballot booth and vote “YES for Raytown!”
Citizens for the Truth in Raytown
9:28, again, half information with no substance to back it up tony jacobs
Citizens for Truth? Sounds like something from the French Revolution.
9:54 pm -
Where have you been? Jean Peters Baker has prosecuted more sex offenders in Jackson County than any other Prosecutor in the state. She won't sit still for Greitens nonsense, lies and half-truths. He will be convicted and impeached.
Wrong 10:00 PM. I remember Finance Director giving a mid-year analysis report that stated a projected revenue to expenses operating loss of about 3 Million. And mid year wasn’t September since Raytown city budget year runs from November to November.
8:26 That's a funny. Overfunding the Fire District.
Several years ago they reduced their levy and rolled back to the citizens money that was not needed. They are the only department in the city that seems to be holding up their collective end.
How much do you think gets dumped into ems ABOVE the collections to keep that circus going? 3 maybe,4 or,500,000.00? All the while we cant staff a jail and our police are leaving for better jobs in city's that support the Police.
Raytown is long gone from what it used to be the bedroom community that the board wanted 30 years ago when they turned down the chance to annex the land from 40 hiway to 470, lees summit road to 435 the city I grew up in is gone.
I for one don't want the city telling me what trash service I will have. I will make my own decision on that one.
9:55 pm
oh, I know. Over time, people tend to forget how much the budget cuts hurt.
We need to look at all city departments, parks and fire department to see where further cuts can be made. Bloated budgets
Jean peters is great at showboating and grandstanding but will only take cases she will win. She doesn’t care about Grietens case only if it helps her political career
Except the city has zero control of the fire department. Try again.
If the city comes out with a plan for the tax initiatives, I will give it an honest objective look, that’s all any of us can do
That is part of the problem. I have not seen or even heard a rumor of a plan. Dire warnings of the sky falling is not a plan. Endless platitudes and speeches written before a meeting are not a plan either. How about some simple promises? A promise not to lower the funding on street repair would be nice. Problem is, the Board has done this before. Remember the Storm
Sewer / Park tax split? We were promised a split of the revenue to go to Storm Sewer repair and the other part to go to the Parks.
A rational person would consider a split to mean half and half. For three years there was not any split. It all went to parks! When the whistle was blown on that scheme it ended up being something like 75% parks and 25% storm sewer.
These kind of word games are a trademark of the city council.
I would not blame the voters if they turned ALL the taxes down based on the track record of broken promises by the mayor and city council.
And thank god they aren’t
@10:01 PM
You bring up some good points and common complaints about our City government. I believe that the evidence is going to show that City revenue has been flat for well over a decade. Past City officials have kicked the can down the road, or proposed sales tax measures, trying to shield residents from the truth, when they should have been asking for is a levy increase. With costs going up, and revenues not keeping up with inflation, the City uses sales taxes as a band-aid.
Now someone with common sense and knows their history
You can always tell the facebook writers. One or two sentences and they are done.
Oh well. It is good to read some of the other posts. The inflationary use of percentage based taxes like the city's sales tax, property tax and utility taxes (natural gas, electricty, telephone, cable tv, cell phone and even the tax we pay on our internet service is immune to inflation because as the cost grows for the service, so does the amount of tax paid for that service.
It appears that some writers want to ignore that reality.
The problem at city hall is the waste ignored by the city council. Last year the BOA stopped the practice of over half of the pd taking cars home. But still the practice of using city equipment for Walmart's benefit continues.
The city council found close to $100,000 at the last meeting. Nearly all of it ended up going to the police department. Absolutely nothing for streets. When was the last time the streets were striped with turning lanes, etc. in this town? Drive around and take a look. It has been quite awhile.
Here is another example.
About five years ago this section of the country had an unusually snowy winter. The Raytown pd used it as an excuse to switch from comparatively inexpensive automobiles to SUV because some of the cars they used high-centered in the snow. Since then, the snowfall has been almost non-existent. Global warming is a reality. And this section of the country is proof of it.
So why did the p.d. change over from inexpensive vehicles to gas guzzling SUV's?
Because they could. Just like last Tuesday night. Why did over 80% of the money reapropriated last Tuesday go to the p.d. Because they wanted it. And the majority of the Board jumped right in.
Raytown's problem is not that they do not have enough money. The problem is the Mayor and Board of Aldermen do not have enough common sense to say NO.
Don't buy into the lie that Raytown is not taking in more money than before. The solution to Raytown's financial problems is some common sense. Something that is currently in short supply at Raytown City Hall.
8:58
There is a guy that speaks to the board EVERY meeting and rambles on multiple topics in the most incoherent way possible. You remind me of him. He is the local gadfly of Raytown according to some.
"There is a guy that speaks to the board EVERY meeting and rambles on multiple topics in the most incoherent way possible."
Concur. Does he practice in front of a mirror? With a stop watch?
Is. Every. Word. So. Vital. So. Important. That. He. Believes. That. He. Must. Ram. It. All. In. So. That. We. Must. Not. Miss. One. Single. Utterance? Despite the common man not being able to comprehend 3/4 of what is spoken?
Even the most optimized of cerebellums can only process language at a certain speed.
Dude needs to check himself. Whatever message that he's trying to put out there is lost in all the jibber jabber.
He has a right to express himself and takes advantage of this on a regular basis.
The opportunity is obviously the highlight of his week. We always either turn down the sound or fast forward, however.
We'd rather run our nails down a chalkboard than sit through that.
The rambling incoherent guy that speaks at the board of aldermen meetings is tony Jacobs. He replaced joe creamer as the local conspiracy theorist
Ah yes, joe Cramer, reincarnated
Yes. And some of those rambling incoherent guys are elected to run our city. In their view they are doing a great job. They never find fault with any decision no matter how wrong it may be. Make a deal to bring a Walmart to town that is slowly bankrupting the town and then blame the taxpayers with lies about the city not bringing in any new tax dollars!
Find some extra money and dump it where you always have, on the police department. Quietly walk tip toe around the elephant in the room named infrastructure.
This city has been mismanaged. Warning signs of over-spending by elected and appointed city officials is routinely ignored. Joe Creamer used to be your scapegoat. Now it is Tony Jacobs? Who is next? Do you really think you hang all of your mistakes on Jacobs and Creamer? They are not the ones in power.
Get down to business. Run your city more efficiently.
Tony rambles with a lot of words, but he doesn’t back it up with facts. I’m surprised that they’ve kept him on as an administrator on the unleashed Facebook page, with his behavior. It’s hard to take them seriously with Tony at the helm.
7:50 who up there on the council made a deal with Walmart to bring them in on that TIF? One left...Aziere! Creamer obviously did too and put his mouth on TV like it was a good move. Thats the true story of whats killing this town, not the pennies some on here see.
Looking forward to voting "NO"!
I live within my budget and so should the city.
You guys are really unfair. When Tony carries your water you treat him like he is BFF. When he says something you don't agree with you treat him terrible. Why not let him have his say in peace?
"I’m surprised that they’ve kept him on as an administrator on the unleashed Facebook...hard to take them seriously with Tony at the helm."
Antonio aside, most people already humor the "owner", the "admins" and their drama anyway. That handful are birds of a feather. Higher quality and more enjoyable banter elsewhere, IOHO.
So now global warming is being used to attack the RPD. All righty then!
At least Tony has his name out there. I don't see many of you folks signing your names!
Since the RPD is a hot topic on here, don't forget that the Citizen's Police Academy will be held in Sept at the Raytown library.
FREE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Well then you can’t complain about services cut or minimized then because the city shouldn’t raise the budget. And they can’t do that without raising taxes. Have fun with that.
No going back on the Walmart deal. Put it to rest. The city need a little money from each person to bounce back. I want good roads and good service, public works, etc. some will vote no,
I will vote YES to SAVE OUR CITY.
Tony Jacobs is thinking about running for alderman. Think about that for a minute.
Silly argument about global warming. There may have been a shortage of money back when it used to snow heavily during the winter. That certainly did not slow the pd down from purchasing more expensive vehicles for day to day police work. Wait til gasoline prices shoot back up. Then the piper will have to be paid.
Once again. The problem at city hall is poor management of our tax dollars. Voting yes on taxes that rise with inflation is irresponsible and will hurt many Raytowners on fixed incomes. Voting yes will only encourage more wasteful spending of our tax dollars.
I urge every one reading this to vote NO on ALL three of the tax increases the city is trying to force on us. Do not reward incompetence and mismanagement. Tell your friends to vote NO.
YES, 7:21 has it right we can not un-ring the bell on the Walmart deal.
Only a handful of Walmart haters continues to bang that drum.
There are much bigger fish to fry.
I will vote YES. This city must move forward.
No. I don't think so. The sad part is the BOA has not learned from their mistakes like Walmart. It is apologists like you you shore them up in thinking they did the right thing, they were just unlucky because of things beyond their control.
Voting yes is approval of incompetence. We really deserve better. VOTE NO on all the Raytown tax increases.
Especially the doubling of our property tax, creation of a 2% sales tax on all internet purchases, and creating a gasoline tax when the state has will have us vote on a ten cent per gallon tax in November.
VOTE NO
As if the Walmart deal is why we are needing money we need to stop the off duty work using city equipment and uniforms.
We also need to sue Walmart for protesting their taxes in Raytown after the deal they already got and for going around claiming they paid there taxes.
Sorry your taxes are NOT paid until the funds are released.
8:18 pm
The current board is not responsible for Walmart. This happened 14 years ago. And why are you advocating the City should suffer for a decision made that long ago? AND how much longer should the City be made to suffer for this mistake? The current group of elected officials are not incompetent. 90% of them were not on the board at the time the tiff for Walmart was voted on. What you are saying is the same as blaming Trump for the invasion of Iraq. Makes no sense, and wildly deceptive.
Next you leave out DETAILS. The internet sales tax should be called the Amazon tax, as this is one company that will collect municipal sales taxes willingly and with little effort on the City’s part. Self reporting, for purchases made on internet sites that do not collect municipal taxes, is only required by residents if they spend more than $2,500 per year. Amazon is where the money is coming from on this tax. All goes to general fund.
The gas tax, with a weekly fill up, would cost .30 cents per fill up on a 15 gallon tank. $1.20 per month. Folks.... That’s the gas tax. $15.60 per year. All goes to roads.
Walmart pays taxes, all goes to pay back the tiff. Can you site a news article that says Walmart has not paid?
I won't vote for a tax increase until the chief and mayor resign.
Wal-Mart paid their property tax assessment under protest in 2017 which meant the property tax money collected at the county did not get distributed to Raytown and is being held up. The assessors office did not grant their protest request which meant that the next level of appeal by Wal-Mart was to the County Board of Equalization which also turned down their protest amount. Meanwhile the roughly $380,000 of tax money still sits in the County vaults.
But the delay game continues!!
Wal-Mart now is executing the next level of available appeals to the state level and is in the “process” of scheduling an Evidentary Hearing to present their case to. If once again they fail in their attempt to lower their assessed property tax value the last stop is to have the 3 members of the State Tax Commission review their appeal and be the final say on the matter. Depending on the back log of case files and summer vacation schedules, it could easily be late fall before this series of appeals would get a final settlement decision. Of note 2 of the Tax Commission members have local political history. Will Kraus and Victor Callahan. It’s safe to say Wal-Mart knows the game very well as they have executed this tactic to success in several states as recent as KS with favorable judgements.
Meanwhile communities are left in revenue collection limbo.
Steve Meyers,
Alderman Ward 4
To all saying the city needs to live within it's budget, it's my understanding from the BOA meetings that the city hasn't lived within it's budget for awhile and used up the savings that the city had, because they didn't want to put a tax increase on the ballot. To May 23, 2018 at 8:58 PM- the money that was "found" was the PD's and just reallocated to a different item in the PD because it wasn't needed where it was at. To those complaining about the use of off duty officers are Walmart, Hy vee, the library and several other places also use them. It doesn't cost the PD to have the vehicle there, and in case there's some sort of call that requires more officers than those on duty, those working off duty switch to on duty and have everything ready to go. I'm honestly confused on how people say that Wal Mart some how benefits from the police vehicle, other than people see it and it might deter a crime, in which case isn't that a good thing?
What have the Chief and Mayor done that has anything to do with budget problems?
I think some past administrators and administrations had everything to do with it all by their mismanagement and ignoring an upcoming crisis.
You won’t vote for an increase until they resign? They are elected officials. Don’t hold the city hostage because they won’t resign. That’s ridiculous. Don’t vote for them when they are up for re-election if you don’t like the job they are doing. We have the power with our votes. Pass the taxes. Get rid of the elected officials that aren’t doing the job we want them to do. It’s that simple.
10:17 you are so up the mayor and police you don't know the real crock is.
Get up and call the county they will tell you the truth that walmart is holding funds.
Post a Comment