By Charissa Graves
From The Graves
I haven’t lived in Kansas very long, so when I first heard the term “mill levy” at a city council meeting, I fully thought that some sort of construction project was being discussed. Since then, I’ve had to become quite familiar with the concept rather quickly in order to do my job effectively.
So my question is this: Why is that the system that was decided on?
Even though I can now say I mostly understand the math involved, I cannot for the life of me figure out who would come up with this type of system and why it’s endured this long.
I’m not even saying that I think the system is wrong or should be changed. I am, however, saying that it seems unnecessarily convoluted, and that I have observed the stress it causes taxpayers and local elected officials.
I should clarify that, if you had asked me a month ago, I wouldn’t have had any opinion on property tax systems, even where I grew up. For as long as I can remember, my family and myself have always lived in homes owned by someone else.
Now, though, I’ve done my homework. You could probably skip the numbers if you want, but they provide helpful context.
According to Tax Foundation’s statistics from 2023, Sacramento County, Calif., where I grew up, had an effective property rate of 0.76% and received a median estimate of $3,768 in property taxes paid. On the other hand, Reno County had a rate of 1.74% and received a median property tax payment of $2,100.
For added context, Sacramento County and Reno County’s number of occupied households in that year were estimated to be 568,223 and 25,344, respectively, according to StatsAmerica. So, it can be estimated that Sacramento County brought in somewhere in the neighborhood of $2,141,064,264 in property tax, compared to $53,222,400 in Reno County property tax revenue.
Sacramento County’s budget from the 2023-2024 fiscal year shows a total expenditure budget of $8,763,971,602, whereas Reno County’s 2023 budget shows an allowance of $61,177,332.
So, that means that property taxes were able to cover 24% of Sacramento County expenditures from that fiscal year, compared to 87% for Reno County.
Finally, based on these numbers, I was able to factor in population to estimate that, per person, I grew up in a county that spent approximately $5,439 in a year, as opposed to the estimated $995 per person Reno County paid in 2023.
Ok, that’s enough math for now.
I wouldn’t dream of saying that the system I grew up under is the correct one. I love California, and I think it has many virtues, but pretty much everyone knows by now that our government is not one of them. I could talk for hours about the mismanaged funding if given the opportunity.
I will, however, say that, despite the high cost of living, and the fact that it increases every year, in 20 years I’ve never seen the same level of stress surrounding property tax that I’ve seen in the past month. Now, part of that is that now it’s my job to notice it, but I’d argue that possibly a larger part would be the fact that people here feel like their own neighbors are the ones displacing them.
While the state of Kansas has wonderful transparency laws regarding taxation and public hearings, they’ve still put an enormous burden on local government. By providing limited funding and resources, they’ve forced city and county officials to recoup the majority of their own costs, and in doing so have created the perfect scapegoat for themselves.
There has to be a middle ground. People should be able to invest in their own community without becoming financially ruined, local government should be able to do their job effectively, and the state should recognize and invest more in these growing communities full of hardworking individuals.