Board of County Commissioners - Regular Meeting

We're going to get work done this year.

Well, good morning everyone and welcome to the Sedgwick County Board of Commissioners meeting. We're glad you're here today. Welcome to those joining online, Facebook and YouTube and everyone joining us in person. When you walk in, we encourage you to grab a meeting agenda packet that allows you to follow along with all the items we're discussing at the County Commission meeting. If you're ever curious about all the supporting documents, you have access to those at www.sedgwickcounty.org. We've got a Big meeting today with our budget, so let's get to work. Call our meeting to order for August 26, 2026. Madam Clerk, first item.

Invocation to be led by Pastor Bob Beckler, Central Community Church. Please remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Good morning, Pastor. Good morning. Let's pray. Heavenly Father, thank you for this time that we have today. And we pause before this meeting and we come before you and we just acknowledge to you, Lord, we need your help. I pray, Lord God, for these commissioners that have been elected. They've been appointed. They've been chosen by you for a task. As they tackle all of the problems and the issues that are before them, I pray, Lord, you would give them wisdom. I pray that you would give them clarity. I pray, Lord God, that you would give them unity in what they're about to do. Thank you, Father, for what you're about to do. And we just pray that you would just bless this day. And it's in Jesus' name we pray. Amen.

I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

Next item, please.

Roll call. Commissioner Meitzner. Present. Commissioner Beatty. Present. Commissioner Hunt. Present. Commissioner Weiss. Present. Chairman Blubaugh.

Next item.

County Announcements.

Good morning, Nicole.

Good morning, Chairman and Commissioners. Nicole Gibbs of Strategic Communications. We're going to kick off today with good news. The Sheriff's Office deputy recently completed his check ride to serve as a Tactical Flight Officer, or TFO, in a unique partnership between Sedgwick County and the Kansas Highway Patrol Air Support Unit. The TFO plays a critical role within the Air Support Unit during aerial law enforcement operations. Colonel Brian White is here to share more about this good news. Sir?

Morning, Colonel White. Good morning, Commissioners. Thank you for having me here this morning. We do have some special guests here, and we want to thank you for allowing us to come here this morning to share this good news. We have Deputy Temish, who is our new tactical flight officer. He just graduated from this program. A few short weeks ago, Captain Schreiber and Lieutenant Hill from Kansas Highway Patrol Tactical Flight Unit, they're also here. We have a short video we wanted to play you. It's just two minutes in length, but we hope you enjoy this. So we'll share this video now. Okay.

All right, speaking around 100 still. All board of ground units, that is the suspect. Good work. I'm Deputy Ethan Temish. I'm a deputy with Sedgwick County. I'm attached to the Kansas Highway Patrol's air support unit as a TFO or tactical flight officer. And Sheriff, could you give us the reason for stopping? I run the radios. I run the camera. Whether that's infrared or daytime, I'm the one that is coordinating whatever call the ground units need me to coordinate.

What the TFO is, what the tactical flight officer is, is an effective crew member. They're an integral part of the crew member, the mix, the flight crew. It is the most critical position within the flight crew.

Looks like he probably just threw something.

That is the enabler. If we don't have an effective tactical flight officer, it doesn't work.

He's going to be wearing a black hoodie and blue jeans. He's got a ball cap on.

Really the beauty of the tactical flight officer program is we can get that local expertise, that geographic local knowledge that they know those back roads and those city streets far better than we ever could.

to make contact. Looks like he is taking off northbound on Seneca.

Air support exists predominantly and primarily to support and enable the boots on the ground to do their hard jobs.

If it's important to you, it's important to me. I work for you on the ground and my whole goal is to make sure that you get home at the end of the day safe.

Deputy Timish went through a rigorous selection process and then also quite a bit of training to reach this position and graduate. I'm going to have Captain Schreiber from the Kansas Highway Patrol Tactical Flight Unit come up and kind of talk a little bit about his training.

Morning, Captain. Good morning. Thank you for having us. So the Tactical Flight Officer program was first conceived back in November of 2023. So first pitched, it was an idea that Lieutenant Hill, Lieutenant Tower, who's not with me today, and myself kind of had envisioned to incorporate across our three sites across the state, both Topeka, Wichita, and Hayes. And the concept basically is beforehand we always had two pilots on board, one to fly the aircraft and one to operate the systems, but that really limits how much I can staff aircraft. And so the concept of bringing expert knowledge, that local regional expertise into our unit to kind of augment us and basically train people to be that tactical flight officer is an enabler and basically doubled my staffing, so to speak. It was kind of the concept. So we pitched that to Colonel Smith, and he absolutely was up. you know, loved the concept and approved it. And basically it was up to us at that point in time to craft what was that going to look like. So there was, again, Colonel already mentioned it, the selection process was very in-depth. There was 13 that originally went through it, both troopers, deputies, and police officers with Wichita PD. We started it here in the Wichita area. That concept evolved from basically the selection process, and then there was the onboarding process, which was very lengthy. I'll have Lieutenant Hill, who's with me today. He's my TFO, or Tactical Flight Officer Program Manager. We're both instructors on the TFO side of it. And Lieutenant Hill, talk to him about what that looks like.

Yeah, good morning. So the check ride specifically is a culmination of everything that the video talked about that Ethan and the captain both spoke to as far as the initial training that we came up with. It is all-encompassing as far as our airborne law enforcement operations. The pilot, you know, most of the time we have the easy job. We're just driving. The tactical flight officer is driving everything else from the state-of-the-art equipment to being that liaison piece, the comms piece, to the folks on the ground, all of the units that were supporting the different law enforcement agencies. And that's a, you know, from starting out just how to safely maneuver and operate around the aircraft on a live airfield to to the law enforcement function of it, all of it getting folded in together. It's a lot. And the checkride is, like I said, kind of the culmination of all of that training, which ended up being about six months. And that was hustling. That was a lot to cram into six months. It could have been a year. But we did it. It was very intense training, and we're super proud of Ethan. He performed flawlessly throughout training. Nobody is perfect, but he was as close to it as what we could have asked for from a partner agency, especially one that doesn't have airborne law enforcement of their own. And then the checkride, there's a lot of pressure, right? Not only all of these things that you've learned over the six months leading up to that point, putting them into practice on a live patrol flight with both live scenarios that we're supporting, but simulated scenarios that the instructors are throwing at you. And then Ethan actually, I mean, it's unique in that this is historic, right? He was the first from his agency embedded with us. So he wanted to do well and he did. We're very, very proud.

Absolutely. So that's, in a nutshell, the program in itself. We're hoping to expand it as we add more pilot positions in the future. It's a wonderful program. It's enabled us to be airborne more. So, again, I'm proud of Ethan. Thank you to the Sheriff's Department for essentially kind of giving them to us, so to speak. But, Ethan, if you want to say any words.

Thank you guys for having me. I really have much to say. Outside is the best job I've ever had.

Thank you for having us this morning. I much appreciate it. Congratulations. Certainly appreciate the support that we get from KHB and the partnership with our Sheriff's Department. I'd like to grab a quick picture here in a second with you guys, if that's all right, when we get done with the county announcements. Commissioner, did you guys have any other comments or anything? Okay. Appreciate the partnership. Thank you.

Okay, we do have more county good news. Sedgec County was recently notified that Moody's Investor Service has reaffirmed our AAA rating. This rating reflects the county's strong management of long-term obligations and Moody's positive assessment of the county's long-term financial position. Deputy CFO Brent Shelton is here to tell you more.

Good morning, Brent. Good morning, Chairman Blubaugh. Good morning, Commissioners. For the record, Brent Shelton, your Deputy CFO. It's often something that we take for granted when we're surrounded with people that keep us at the best of the best. And what it's gratifying is when a rating agency like Moody's or Standard & Poor's recognizes that excellent work, that stewardship. Moody's has reaffirmed our AAA debt rating. This is our credit rating as we go out and borrow money. And what this means to the citizens of Sedgwick County is that when we borrow money, we pay the lowest interest rate that's out there in the marketplace because of financial stewardship, because of the things that we do to make sure that we steward the citizens' finances. There's some folks back in the corner of the room over here with our accounting team, our budget team that make this happen. So to Lorien and Hope and their teams, we owe them a debt of gratitude. I would just say that some of the things that happened since we've had this rating for a while, but we got better. The measures got better from 2022 to 2025. Our revenues as a portion of our long-term obligations have increased. Our revenues as a portion of our short-term obligations are in better ratios than they were in the past. The one cautionary tale that they did provide was that The local economy is not growing quite as fast as other pure AAA-rated local governments. So that's something that we try to do is to support that growth in terms of economic development and income levels and so forth for our citizens. So that's something that we continue to monitor. What we do is control what we can and manage what we can't. So I just tell you thank you for your guidance and this great team that we have to steward.

Good feedback, but nothing we're doing internally. That is correct. I certainly appreciate everything you guys do. I know the commission appreciates it. Most importantly, the taxpayers appreciate you guys getting us the lowest interest possible.

So, Commissioner Baker. Yeah, just, this is pretty rarefied error. I just want the public to be aware. I think there's only, I don't remember the exact stat. I think there's 106 counties. from S&P, correct. So the S&P AAA rating that we also hold. There's only 106 counties nationally that have that rating. We've also had five perfect audits. So six, forgive me, CFO will correct me. Which when we ask our third party auditor, that's rarefied air. So it's a credit to the team that's been assembled. What I'm really grateful for is nobody's satisfied. We all know that there's ways that we can continue to improve. There is technology, there's innovation. But what we have here at the county that I do think is really unique is we have a really dedicated staff that cares deeply about not just their performance in their job, but they care about stewarding the taxpayer resources. And that's language we use a lot around here. We talk about the taxpayer a lot around here. And I appreciate that so much. Brent, thank you. Congratulations to all your staff. It's really, really, really impressive.

Really a team effort. We appreciate everybody on the scene. Thank you. And we'd love to grab a picture with you guys as well to honor that when we get completed.

Okay. Sedgwick County offices will be closed on Monday, September 7th in observance of Labor Day. As always, emergency services are available by calling or texting 911. That's all I have for today. I'll stand for any questions.

Okay. Any questions, commissioners? All right. If not, I'd like to take a quick five-minute recess. We're just going to go out and take a couple quick pictures real quick. Be right back. All right, we'll call the meeting back to order. Madam Clerk, next item. Appointments.

Yes, thank you, Chairman. Justin Wagoner, County Counselor. There's one item under appointments, item A, which is to accept the resignation of Stephen Burt from the Sedgwick County First District Citizens Advisory Board and Commissioner Meitzner's District. The recommended action is to accept the resignation.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I want to extend a personal gratitude and thanks to Stephen Burt for serving on this Citizens Advisory Board for well over a year. He's been a valuable asset and a great, as we talked about, things like homelessness and some of those plans, because he's very active in that. But anyway, so Stephen, if you're watching, I appreciate it. Thank you very much, and I'll make a motion that we accept the resignation. Okay, and I'll second that motion.

We have a motion and a second. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty.

Aye.

Commissioner Howe.

Aye.

Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Bubaugh.

Aye. The motion passes 5-0. Next item, please.

Public Agenda.

I have several people signed up on the public agenda. I just want to let folks know how a little bit of kind of set the table of how things are going to work today. There will be several opportunities to speak. You're certainly welcome to speak on the public agenda. We'll also have an opportunity whenever we look at the revenue neutral to speak on that. And then you'll also have an opportunity to speak on the budget. So I'll call your name, and if you want to speak now, you can come up and speak. I think the only limitations is if you did speak last week, you won't be able to speak again this week, just on the public agenda. But you'll still have the opportunity to speak on the budget or the R&R. First up, Diane Berg, and just let me know if you want to speak now or you want to wait until the budget. Yeah, yeah, yeah, five minutes. And if you would, please state your name and address for the record.

My name is Diane Borg. We're at 4400 North, 143rd East in Wichita. On an ordinary day, my husband and I lead busy lives. We kind of go about what we're called to do, and we let you guys do what you're called to do. But we don't usually get involved in county business much. But when we got the property tax increase proposal, I felt a need to come today. If I'm reading it right, it shows that the 2026 proposed tax Increase would be 55% on our property. We live on five acres that we purchased from my husband's parents in 1983, and we paid the going price. It was not free. Approximately the half section was owned by four or five generations of his family for... all that time, but over the years, pieces have been sold off. So I think now we're one of two families left in the half section that still own property. In 1995, we bought a 975 square foot house that was sitting on Andover Road and we moved it out to our five acres. The school district was wanting to get that house off the property so they could build the current school there. Anyway, over time, we put in a lot of sweat equity. We put the house on a basement, so it doubled the size. But we love our little home. And like you, you've seen your taxes go up and down over the years. It's life. It's what happens. But this increase, if I'm reading this right, guys, can you imagine? 55% increase of your taxes. I just had to come and say, surely there's something you can do. And I realized, I'm not blind, I realized that the area that we live in, Pavement is coming toward us. The area is being developed. The people that are buying in the area are buying large pieces of property, and they're developing it. They're putting in great things. We love our neighbors, and we're not upset with any of them. But our property has not changed by 55%. So I would just ask you to keep those things in mind when you're reviewing the things that you look at. We know we're little people. We just want to make our case known.

Thank you. Thank you. Diane, if you don't mind, I'm going to ask you, is that 55% in one year?

Yes, if I'm reading this right.

Okay. So do you mind sharing what your value was before and what it was after?

Okay. Yeah. 2025, the house part shows appraised. Is that what you're asking?

Yeah, I'm just curious what the appraised value was.

127, 690. 2026, 208, 290.

Okay. All right. That's what I was after. Okay.

Commissioner Howell, I believe, has a question for you, too. Thank you. I just wanted a couple of things. First of all, I've known Diane and Dave Borg for almost my entire life. I mean, they're a couple, and I love seeing you here today. Thank you. I'm sorry about the reason you're here, but I love seeing you. I wish we could fellowship sometime. I was wondering if you don't mind, if you stick around just for a few minutes, may I actually have that in my hand for just a few minutes? I'd like to take a look at that online, and I'll, at some point, if it's okay with the chairman, I'd like to Maybe provide a couple comments about that. Yes.

Just this piece right here. Thank you.

And with that, I just want to take a look at this, and I'll be back in a minute. Thank you, Chairman.

Thank you very much, Dan. Caitlin Grunbacher, would you like to speak now or wait for the budget? Yeah, sure. Absolutely. If you would just state your name and address, even though I know you've got it here.

Good morning, commissioners. My name is Caitlin Gruenbacher. I live in West Sedgwick County with my husband and four children that I have with me today, all of whom are going to be participants in the Sedgwick County 4-H program this year. They were not all participants last year, only because we had one too little. So he's finally old enough to participate. I actually grew up in the 4-H program in Saline County where I participated in a variety of projects and activities. I also took on leadership positions at both the local and state level, leading project lessons for younger members and helping to host local events for our community and putting on large conference events for teenage youth across the state. 4-H was an extremely impactful part of shaping the woman that I am today. As the mother of multiple children at all different ages with all different interests, 4-H is one of the few activities we can participate in as a family. Sports, dance, Cub Scouts, and other similar activities are all divided by age and or gender. But in 4-H, we can all attend the same meetings and events. Not only does this alleviate some of the stress of trying to get kids to different practices, but it also gives us much needed family time. 4-H is about collaboration for our family, our club, and our community. Every participant is matched with an appropriate level of engagement. Parents and community members are important role models while youth take on leadership positions that match their skill and age level, such as county leader, club president, or maybe even a song leader for some of our younger members. There is a place in the 4-H organization for everyone. The largest collaborative event for Sedgwick County 4-H is the County Fair. This event is a celebration of all the work the 4-H members have done through the year, but it is also an important opportunity to demonstrate the value of working together and utilizing the unique gifts of individuals. 4-H members help each other with projects, get to learn what other members worked on through the year, and see how powerful it can be when a community comes together over one common goal. The county fair is the most remarkable demonstration of healthy competition that I've ever experienced. While each member is there to be successful, they are also willing to help others. We share guidance, tips, tricks, and even loan equipment or a helping hand when needed. This year, while my son was shoveling out his animal stalls, a boy my son met and befriended during the week stood nearby watching. At one point, I turned around from picking up equipment and noticed that the other boy had left. I assumed he got bored of watching my son shovel sheep poop and went on to find something more interesting to do. But less than five minutes later, that little boy showed up with a shovel and started helping my son. I can assure you that shoveling stalls in July heat is not anyone's favorite activity. However, this 12-year-old boy saw a friend who was doing a much-needed task and chose to help, not because he was asked or not because it was his responsibility, just because it needed done. These are the individuals that 4-H is raising, people who see a task and choose to help. In society, where support and compassion are needed more than ever, we need to support and celebrate our 4-H'ers. 4-H is teaching our youth tangible life skills like sewing, cooking, woodworking, animal husbandry, and so much more. But as youth learn about topics that interest them, they are also learning about collaboration, perseverance, critical thinking, public speaking, and the importance of leadership. I am sure you have all heard the Chinese proverb, give a man to fish and feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime. 4-H is teaching our youth how to fish, promoting self-sufficiency, stewardship, and community engagement. The county fair is a vital part of the 4-H program, and we appreciate your past support, and we hope that you will continue to value the fair with your contributions and make sure our members are considered in your budget today. I'm also going to let you meet the kids. I know you've met Waylon. We're familiar with Waylon. He will be a clover bud this year.

OK. Walter.

Hello. Hello, my name is Walter and I am 10 years old. This is my second year in 4-H and the sheep project. This year I was able to receive all blue ribbons for my lambs, which was an improvement over the last year when I received some red ribbons. Each fair I have had a lot of fun with my friends and enjoy watching them show their animals. A couple of my friends show steers and I'm trying to convince my parents to let me try next year. It's a big animal.

Walter, you did a great job. Did you do project talks in your club?

No. We do. We have not taken opportunity yet.

Okay. Well, you look like you're off to a start there.

We're just swinging for the fences.

Who do we got next? Ava?

This is Eva.

Eva? Okay.

We need a stool.

Hi, my name is Eva, and I am six. And last year I was a clover bud, and I took pottery, and I did pig PB show, and I did goat PB show.

What was your favorite part of the fair?

Pig PB show. And what do you want to take to the fair next year? Pottery and food.

And we got Adeline next.

Yep. Hello, my name is Adeline, and I am eight years old. I've been in 4-H for two years. This year, I took engineering blocks, crafts, and foods to the fair. I got my first purple ribbon with my cookies, and I brought some to share with you today. Oh.

We also have some pictures of the kids at the fair this year. This is their judging. So these are all activities that even kids in town can do. It's not just agriculture kids. Here's Eva with her pottery and her judge. We have Adeline with her purple ribbon cookies that she's sharing with you today. And then Walter and his lambs. And then this was actually something new that my kids participated in. It's a peewee show. So what that means is these younger kids who don't necessarily have an animal, an older 4-H'er who does have an animal can help them show that animal. My kids had a blast. I had a blast watching as a parent my kids chase pigs around the ring. Great time. And then this was the goat peewee show that Eva actually did with my husband's cousin. So that was just really fun to do, really fun to do with family, really fun to do with a goat.

Well, appreciate you guys coming in here today. You know, my kids have shown since they were clover buds, and I just think it's so important for our future to... teaching these kids how to public speak, how to have a project, how to have responsibility, and how to be a contributor to society. We really appreciate that.

Yeah, and I think 4-H really helps fill in some of the gaps that maybe we're lacking in our education system. And it does it around something that the kid's interested in. They learn budgeting, but it's based on, are they interested in clothing? Are they interested in the animals? So some of these really important life skills that we need to be successful.

They learned profit and loss pretty early. Commissioner Howell, would you be glad on?

Actually, I would actually say, number one, bringing the children is not fair. Bringing the children is not fair. What? Bringing the children is not fair. I mean, obviously, you have a lovely family, and your kids are amazing, and you're a sweet family. I think everyone loves to see you come with your kids. It's been a great event to see them engage the way they do. I only have one question for you. Yes. You're deeply involved in 4-H. I am. Have they ever asked you to donate to the extension office, or have you ever donated to the extension office?

We did donate. So this year, not only were we participants, we were volunteers. We were also financial supporters of the fair.

Okay. And did they officially ask you that, or did they have a website? How did you make the donation?

Yeah, they did a campaign for fair and put it out to the clubs, asked the clubs, asked the kids to go see if they could find different organizations that would want to donate, just like most fundraising organizations.

All right. Well, thank you so much for the answer.

Thank you. Caitlin, I did get a chance to look at the numbers, and I believe that Sedgwick County put up around $5,000. And actually, you guys fundraised more than that just to pay for the ribbons, your livestock judges. So it was over $10,000 expense. And I think you guys actually donated more money than what Sedgwick County put up.

Yeah, and I am floored by what the fair board and everybody is able to do with that money. They stretch it. To make all of that happen for all of the county traffic that comes through there, I mean, it's a really big event. And while it is just one section of 4-H, it really pushes our 4-Hers. It's... And it's just a great opportunity to share with the public what we have going on. And again, these are all really critical skills that we need to be good citizens that 4-H is promoting.

I'd be curious what the economic output was from Sedgwick County's $5,000 investment to how many dollars were brought in from the Sedgwick County Fed.

Yeah, I would hope Cheney's getting a little business out there. They deserve it. So we appreciate it. We appreciate you guys coming out and doing the parade. Thank you so much.

Any other questions or comments? Good job. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Next up is Brianna Riley. And if you would, please state your address on the record.

Good morning. My name is Brianna Riley, and my address is 11002 West Jewell Street, Wichita 67209. First, I would like to thank you all for letting me speak to you this morning. And today, I am here to share a bit about 4-H and how being active in this program has influenced me over the past few years. I am currently a member of the College Clovers 4-H Club and serve as club president. I have been in the 4-H program for eight years, but even before that, I was watching my older sisters participate. One of the biggest events in the 4-H year recently wrapped up, the Cedric County Fair. I hope you all had the opportunity to make the trip to Cheney to see all the projects. This year, I entered exhibits in photography and fiber arts, earning five purples and one blue. I also earned a grand champion on my photography class, and the most exciting achievement for me this year at the fair was earning overall department winner on one of my photos. In previous years, I have entered projects in foods, woodworking, clothing, visual arts, style review, and horticulture. The county fair is a wonderful showcase for all the hard work 4-H'ers put into their projects throughout the year and provides a great opportunity to be recognized for the efforts. The Cedric County Fair also provides many leadership opportunities as a 4-H'er. I helped set up the buildings, served as a judge's helper for photography and fiber arts judges, helped with 4-H Teen Council Concession Stand and Barnyard Olympics, and gave a fair tour to one of our state senators, Mr. Chase Blasey. It is fun to have these opportunities to grow in my leadership and organizational skills. Being an active member of 4-H has opened doors to leadership. To excel as a leader, I would likely not learn anywhere else. I have learned so many skills being a 4-H member and am grateful for opportunities to try new things. I feel so confident in my public speaking skills because of 4-H. I understand parliamentary procedure and leading my clubs because of 4-H. I understand working together on committees because of 4-H. Even my older sisters, who are now in college, have repeatedly mentioned how grateful they are for being part of 4-H because those skills are now being used in their adult lives. I'm grateful for the opportunity to speak with you all today. I want to extend thanks to our amazing Extension agent, Stephanie Hayes, for asking me to be here today to share my thoughts and experiences with you. I promise you she did not pull my arm that hard. It's still attached. I hope this shameless plug for 4-H provides you with a little more insight into the value of supporting this program in Sedgwick County. Hundreds of Sedgwick County youth, including myself, are so grateful for all your continued support. Thank you all for your time and attention. Are there any questions?

Thank you very much for being here this morning. And I appreciate it. I've went on the tours in the past. Appreciate you guys taking the time out. And tell me again, how long have you been in the club?

Eight years. Eight years. I have been in the 4-H for eight years.

So did you start out as a Cloverbud as well? I did, yes. Okay. All right.

I got to watch my two older sisters. My family has actually been in the 4-H for over 15 years.

Okay. Commissioner Wise has got a question.

No question. Just want to tell you, you did a great job, and you are very comfortable public speaking, I can tell. Always impressed with the 4-H kids when you guys come up and speak. certainly sets you apart and we can see what you guys are doing. And I went out and had a full tour. Stephanie, thank you for connecting me with my tour guide at the fair this year. It was just amazing. I have a niece that's the treasurer of her club. And though we live a little bit different lives with our kids, I get to appreciate what it's brought out in her as leader in her community as well. So I just love that about you guys. So thank you so much for coming here and you did a really great job. Thank you.

Appreciate you again, you coming here. Just one thing, I might ask a favor. If you see any issues with our parliamentaries, send me some feedback.

I will, don't worry.

All right. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Okay, next up, Stephanie Hayes.

Thank you so much for allowing me to come and speak today. As you can see, we have some amazing youth here in Sedgwick. In preparing my presentation today, I was doing research. Sorry, wrong part of my speech. Don't critique me. Good morning, Commissioners. Thank you for the opportunity to address you today and speak about two specific reasons. The first one is adequately funding the Extension Council. The second one is improved funding for 4-H's portion of the Sedgwick County Fair. My name is Stephanie Hayes. I live at 34200 West 21st Street North in Garden Plain, Kansas. When preparing my presentation today, I was doing research on Sedgwick County's past budgets, and one year in particular caught my eyes. It was 2011. This is because in 2011, the commissioners that were sitting here today increased the county fair allocation by $10,000 to $31,000, just to cover the shortfalls of the 4-H expenditures for judges, ribbons, and premiums. The exact same thing I'm asking you to do today. Interesting, though, today the county fair allocation is $29,000, which the 4-H portion of that is $6,600. And I'm asking for $5,000 to cover the shortfall. The next item I noticed on that budget was that the Extension Council allocation was $1,087,473. That was the year after the 4-H department had lost an agent due to budget cuts. It went from three agents to two agents, providing education for your community. Today, I am your 4-H agent. I provide all the support and all the education for the youth of Sedgwick County. As you know, Sedgwick County is very unique. We are the second most populous county in Kansas, yet agriculture continues to be a major economic force here. Our agriculture generates approximately $175 million in revenue each year, with crops accounting for almost $150 million of that total. We rank in the top county as one of the top counties in Kansas. At the same time, we house the largest city in Kansas, which is Wichita. Our agriculture strength is incredibly diverse. We have grain crops, horticulture, nursery, and greenhouse production. These are all top agricultural production items. Sedgwick County is both urban and agriculture. And 4-H is the only club in Sedgwick County to connect these two worlds. That is why an investment in Sedgwick County Extension and your county fair is much more than an investment in ribbons, premiums, judges, or a four-day event. Sedgwick County has the third largest 4-H program in Kansas and one of the second most populous. Well, the first is Johnson County. The second is a district. It's made up of five different counties. This year at your county fair, we exhibited 2,491 projects with 396 exhibitors participating. Behind every single one of those exhibitors was a young person, just like you saw today, who had a goal. They learned a skill. They completed a project. They had to accept evaluation and stand behind the work they accomplished. Some livestock, agro plants, but many of our members Sorry, I lost my place. But many of our members live here in Wichita and suburban communities and never have the opportunity to raise an animal or grow crops. Through 4-H, they develop skills through foods, nutrition, horticulture, woodworking, photography, STEM, natural resources, entrepreneurship, leadership, shooting sports, and the list goes on and on and on. The county fair gives those young people... people a place to demonstrate what they've learned, receive feedback from knowledgeable results, and experience both success and disappointment. Those experiences develop responsibility, perseverance, communication, confidence, and work ethic. These are the qualities that we need in tomorrow's citizens and tomorrow's businesses need from their workforce. Your Sedgwick County young people aren't simply participating, they're competing and succeeding at the highest levels. This year, our Sedgwick County youth have achieved national level success in poultry judging, livestock judging, geology, shooting sports, and horticulture. Last weekend, our meat judging individuals

Finish your thought.

Okay, thanks. I meet judging individuals placed first and seventh out of 90 youth at our state event. Okay, can I finish my last paragraph, or should I stop?

Yeah.

I've never went over on time before, ever.

I know. I want to be consistent, but I do want to ask you a couple questions.

Absolutely.

So I appreciate everything you do for 4-H, and you guys are changing the lives of so many kids out there. One of the conversations with commissioners comes up a lot is, and you're wearing a K-State shirt. Help us better understand the relationship with Kansas State in regards to funding, resources. What does that look like?

Well, K-State is our land-grant university, and it covers a portion of our agent salaries. But it also provides us with all of the research and educational materials that we go out and utilize within your communities. So what they do is they support us more knowledge-based than they do financially. And I'll let Kelly speak to the portion of our budget that they give us. But we are truthfully Sedgwick County employees more than we are K-State employees. And that's because we are here, all of our agents at the Extension Council are here to serve the county's needs. But we utilize the information and all of the research that's actually in every land grant across the nation. There's an extension in every state across the nation, every county across the nation.

Okay. I appreciate that because I know some other counties, it's like a branding exercise, like they use their county extension. You're not a K-State extension. You are Sedgwick County extension.

Right. So really, it's Sedgwick County and small things? Yeah. But truthfully, I need Sedgwick to be a Sedgwick County extension. Part of K-State.

Okay. So if I understand it right, K-State is providing the resources where if we're out there testing seeds or doing something crops, you don't have labs here. Right. Exactly. Utilizing...

Right. Their field testing, their knowledge, their research. And it's everything from youth development that I'm focused on because I'm in every school in this county. I can teach classes in every school. And I run the 4-H program, which is across the county. But like our family and consumer science ladies, there's people out there teaching parenting classes. There's people teaching food and nutrition safety. There's people working on the aging and Medicaid issues. We have agents for everything that serve everybody. the county. That's our goal. Our goal is to be your go-to people to help with whatever issues is here in Sedgwick County.

Okay, Commissioner Brady. I love it. I just want to thank you publicly for all the work you do. Thank you. It's a lot. My family, we run 3,000 head of Angus cattle, so we don't just have, we have a large operation, so you don't have to convince me of the value of that.

But we have research for that, for sure.

Yeah, well certainly. Well, based on some of these moves coming from the federal government, we're going to have to make a call and have a conversation. I want to try to level set a little bit of the conversation because you do not have to convince me in the value of what happens at extension or the value of 4-H. This is what makes budget day so unique here at the county. I'm looking at... an EMS director who in July had over 100 minutes of status zero events, meaning there were zero ambulances available in Sedgwick County in July. We have got to scale public safety. I'm looking at a couple who just spoke And they're one of many couples and many fixed income and working class families that the cost of government is outpacing their capacity to stay in their homes. So this is the level set as to how we try to make these decisions. You do not have to convince me in the value of what you do. Our citizens cannot afford the growing cost of government. If I had a checkbook, because I believe wholly, I would just go, go, go, because I believe in what you do. But I've got to get more ambulance on the street. I'm hoping that the education... I'm so sorry. We got to get more ambulances on the street. We got to make sure that our sheriff has the capacity to run a jail. That if we saw the presentation just a couple weeks ago, that he's having to send inmates out of county now. And we got to make sure people like them are protected so they can stay in their homes. I think that we're good enough here to find a way and to find that balance. But this is the gravity of the decisions we have to make and how we allocate resources as we kind of government. So I just want you to know as we go about that process today. Yes, yes, and amen on all the work that you do. But I think we'll find a path over a long course of time. Even if I can't support a path today, I think we'll find a path in the long term. But we've got some significant priorities that we've got to address right now. Significant. That in finding the balance of how we invest in these young people while making sure that people are safe in our community, that's a really tough balance. And making sure people like them can stay in their homes. So I appreciate the context of the conversation. I just want you to know publicly how much we value the work that you do and how we're going to continue to try to find paths to support the work that you do.

All right. And thank you for that. I truly believe the education we provide at the Extension Office will help it so not so many people have to be in ambulances. And so we can provide, and I hope you start coming to the extension when we have problems. Health and nutrition, and it's one of our biggest things that we go out and we help people with to help them stay healthy. But yes, absolutely, we need ambulances.

Commissioner Howells, comment or question? I'll just say, Mr. Chairman, thank you for the... the presentation. I don't think anybody here is going to say that the Extension Center is not invaluable to this community. I think what you do is tremendous and is needed and appreciated by the entire community. I would be very confident in saying that. The challenge is, of course, revenue. And I've said for years that we ought to Again, I have to say this coupled together because people misinterpret what I'm saying here. But a small sales tax to offset property tax, this is, in my opinion, better funded through a sales tax rather than a property tax. I don't want property tax to be the go-to place. And all of the culture art things we do as a county, I think, are going to continue to struggle because they're property tax dependent and people are done. We've got to find a way to trim their property taxes. So this is, again, just another check in that discussion that's saying we owe it to the people to give them the option to lower their property taxes, and we can depend on some of our visitors to pay the cost, and they get the benefit. I would encourage the Extension Office to be more robust in their fundraising. I don't know if they're doing enough because I was online yesterday. There's no place online to donate. I couldn't find it anyway.

Okay. There is one under the 4-H thing because we worked very hard this year to get sponsorships. Everything that I program is either grant-funded or sponsorship-funded. We don't get any programming dollars, and none of us that are agents are marketing people. So we're working very hard to be able to program.

Just so the public knows, it was a couple of years ago we reduced them about 10%, I believe. It was around $82,000. And I know there's going to be a motion today to restore that funding. And, again, that's going to be a decision we have to make whether we want to take $82,000 this year and this year's budget and restore that funding. $125,000? $125,000. $120,000 for that plus $5,000 for the fare. Okay. My memory's not great. Thank you. Thank you for the phone, my friend. But anyway, that's the question. So as we talk about the extension office and its value, the question is, do you want to raise property tax to solve this problem? That's the question. We've got to figure this out.

I pay property tax, too, here in Sedgwick County, so I understand that. I have a home evaluation that was similar to theirs.

I can already hear the newspaper saying, you know, it's only five cents per household or whatever. It's a small amount of money, but everything adds up. Everyone's got an argument. There's more than 2,000 nonprofits in this community. They all do great work, okay? They all want help. We're going to talk about the Arts Commission here, Arts Council here shortly. Their funding allocation is $9,000. It's a principal issue for me. You might say it's just a penny, a penny or two per household, but to me it's a principal issue. It's not a core, actually Extension Office, I think it actually is a core function. The question is how do we fund it?

Because we're an educational institution. We're not arts and community service, or we are a community service. We're not arts and culture. We are the education...

system for cedric county in fact it's under the community development tab yeah absolutely you know again i'm not gonna say it's not valuable it is but we've got to find ways to trim our budget you know people are previous comments i i can't echo them enough we have we it's upon us to find ways of doing things creatively without going to property taxes or go to place we've got to find another way so thank you for the no

Thank you guys all. And thank you for all you do up here. That's a hard decision. And there's lots of us pulling at your shirt tails.

Thank you very much. Before I call up the next speaker, I do want to, you know, I've heard property taxes brought up here, and I think this commission's got to get serious about accurate valuations with the boards. We've got to better explain why their valuation went up 55% in one year, and we started in that conversation yesterday, and I was not satisfied with any of the answers I got, and hopefully we can continue that conversation with accurate assessments.

Commissioner Howell? Yeah, whenever you're ready. I have some feedback for the Borg family, and I would love to tell you what I've discovered about your notification, if that's okay. Whenever the appropriate time. Yeah, go ahead. Okay, great. And I do appreciate you bringing this. And I'll say once again, the revenue neutral rate for your home would be a $233 increase just to be revenue neutral rate. And really, that's one of the discussions we have to have today. is whether or not we want to exceed the revenue neutral rate. What that would be is lowering the mill levy to create the same tax dollars as we had last year. So not any tax levy increase for the aggregate of our community. What we know is there's individual homes that went down in value, some went up in value, some went up too much. And that's why we have an appeals process. In your situation, I don't know why it's so volatile. Let me just make a couple of points here. In 2021, it went down 2%. In 2020, it went down 9%. In 2017, it went down 7%. In 2018, it went down 19%. And then I think last year, 2025, it went down 11%. So that's five years you actually had reductions in value. But then the other years, you had increases. I don't know why it's that volatile. I have no idea. I couldn't begin to explain that. So one of the things I continue to say, and I'll say it again today, the appraiser's office to me is a bit of a mystery. I don't know how they drive their values. I know they have to follow state law. They've got data they use, and sometimes they make mistakes. This could be a mistake. There's one of three options. Either it is correct now, possibly. We don't know. I'll just tell you that Zillow thinks it's worth a lot more than what this says for what it's worth. That's not a major data point, but it's something just to note that in your mind. It could be accurate now and it was wrong before. Or it could be that it was correct before and it's correct now. It just increased in value for whatever reason. Or it could be that it's wrong now, in which case we have an appeals process. And I don't know if you guys made an appeal or not, but we want you guys, if you feel like your property is overvalued, we really, really begging you, please, to go make an appeal and explain that to the appraiser as to why you believe it's overvalued. It's not a perfect system. Every state does use property taxes, and sometimes there are errors. And we recognize that there are errors. And unfortunately, the burden of proof is on the taxpayer, unlike a criminal trial. The burden of proof is on you. You've got to bring us reasons for you to convince the appraiser that it's overvalued. I don't love this system. I would tell you that our increase on your taxes for Sedgwick County is a 4.6% increase. And for you, that's, by the way, 22% of your total tax bill is Sedgwick County. Our tax increase for you, if I have this somewhere here... I don't know. It's not on my paper here, so I may have lost the data. Oh, it's $32.43. So our tax increase for Central County, our budget increase for your home is $32 a year. I wish I could make that lower. I mean, we do things like we don't... If we were to cut, let's say, $9,000 here and not put $120,000 back in the extension office, things like that, we're talking about small amounts of money that's so small you may not even realize it happened. We're talking about $0.10, $0.20, $0.30 in your tax bill, such small numbers that you may not recognize we actually worked really hard to lower this budget. So the real concern here, I think, is that the appraiser increased your value by 63% in one year. And how they did that, I have no idea. I wish I could answer that question. But that's a function of the county appraiser, and I say the word county appraiser with a little bit of caution, because frankly, even though we pay for their salary, we provide their office, we provide all the things they have to do their job, we don't actually direct them in how to do their job. That's directed from the state of Kansas through the Constitution, state laws, and rules and regulations from Property Evaluation Division. So they're subject to the authority of those three agency organizations, Constitution, State Law, and Property Valuation Division. And there's a director of PVD, and he answers to the Department of Revenue, which answers to Governor Kelly. So there is a whole system of state oversight on how appraisals are done, which is a state function. The state says, we're out of the property tax business. What they mean by that is they don't collect property taxes to run state government. but they are in total control of how property taxes are determined, if you will. All that's subject to the state. We have no control over the how. We only have control over our budget. So we could cut millions of dollars out of this budget, and you might see your property taxes go down by a few dollars. That's the reality we have to deal with today. So I'm glad you're here today. I hope that it helps people understand the difficulty of how taxes work My only recommendation to you would be please discuss this with the appraiser and find out why they changed it to 63%. I don't have any way to know that. And I wish I could have some control there, but we don't have control by design. So with that, I'll hand this back to you through our staff. Thank you so much for coming. If you have any questions or comments, I'd love to hear them back. ask you to hopefully consider what I've said today. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Commissioner, I don't want to downplay their increase because, and to be completely transparent, when you say the dollar amount, you're only talking about the Sedgwick County portion of the property tax. You're not talking about maybe over 50% for the school district. I don't want to downplay the increase.

I would, you know, the dollars I discussed a minute ago, those are Sedgwick County tax dollars specifically. And you pay to about eight or nine different taxing jurisdictions. This is to be clear. I would say the overall tax rate that you had, the overall tax rate has gone down by just... I'm talking about mill levy rate, has gone down just a tiny, tiny bit less than five mils over the last 10 years. So you've had a reduction in mill levy rate by about five mils. So again, the governing bodies have not substantially increased the mill levy rate, but they've not substantially decreased it either. And I would argue, I think Sedgwick County, this is the fourth year in a row we've lowered the mill levy rate. I wish it could be more. Again, we still have a tax levy increase of 4.6%. According to the bookings, subtract out Wichita State University, it's 4.2%. So the question is, is that reasonable? Well, we look at consumer price index. We look at new construction or population growth and say, is that a reasonable number? We're pretty close. If we were to change that by one or two tenths of a percent, I think you'd make the argument that it's really pretty close to consumer price index plus population plus new construction. So we're trying to show responsibility in our budget. I don't think the other taxing jurisdictions have been quite as responsible as I think this county has been. So does that help a little bit? Yeah, yeah.

I appreciate that. I just wanted to be very clear. We're going to have a lot of difficult conversations today because we are very fiscally responsible, and I can't speak to all the other taxing entities on there, but we do have responsibility to reappoint the appraiser and to ensure those evaluations are accurate.

And lest I get misquoted, we have all kinds of ideas on how to address property tax reform in Kansas. I'm begging the state to hear us because I think we've got some great ideas on how to address property tax reform. Second of all, I don't like the current system. I think it's got a lot of problems. But at the end of the day, it's the system we have right now. And I don't love it. I'm not here to defend it. I'm not defending what the appraiser does. I simply say they are subject to state control. And although I'm trying to understand it, I can't understand a 63% increase. So I'm not here to defend it. I'm not here to say it's wonderful. In fact, we have all kinds of reform ideas on how to maybe make it better. So with that, I want to make sure that people don't take me out of context again. Thank you.

I just want to address that. I just don't believe there's consistency. We have 105 counties. We have 105 different appraisers that interpret things. property taxes. You can see the fluctuations in your own values, how one appraiser has viewed it from another. So it's very subjective. I still contend it's a broken system and we just got to do everything we can to try to fix it. So thank you very much. Next speaker, Mike Betson, if you would please state your address when you come up, Mike. You're going to wait until the... Okay. Thank you, Mike. Okay. Jalen Clausen.

Thank you.

Good morning. Good morning, commissioners. My name is Jalene Claussen. I'm the executive director of the Treehouse, a Wichita nonprofit that supports moms and babies through education, material assistance, genuine personal care. Our address is 151 North Volusia, Wichita, Kansas 67214. I know I just heard you talk about K-State and the budget and all that, but that's what I'm here to talk to today, so I'm going to share that. I'm honored to speak today about the impact K-State Research and Extension Office has had on the families that we serve. Not all families are fortunate enough to grow up in homes that have 4-H. building the stability around them in our early age. At the Treehouse, we believe we are in the preventative care business, and so is the K-State Research and Extension Office. We have the opportunity to invest in families during the early critical years of their lives, from birth to the age of five, helping parents build the knowledge, confidence, and resources they need to become strong, stable families. Many of the moms who walk through our doors are navigating limited resources, isolation, tremendous pressures from all around, but they share one thing. They want to give their children a better start that they may not have had themselves when they were growing up. The K-State Research and Extension Office meets moms right where they are. They bring a wealth of resources to the Treehouse families through programs like Better Brains for Babies, Eat Smart, Move More, Survive, Strive, Thrive, money habitudes, bonding through board games. These moms are learning practical skills, how their child's brain develops, how to prepare healthy meals on a budget, how to strengthen their families, and how to build healthy relationships. One mom in our Survive, Strive, Thrive class said it beautifully, I'm learning so many things that I should have already known. I didn't grow up with healthy parents, but this class gives me a new perspective on parenting. I'm sad for my loss of a childhood, but I'm excited to give my little girl a different story. That is the impact K-State can have. In 2026 alone, the K-State Research and Extension Program resulted in 171 class visits from Treehouse moms. This year is not over. That's 171 visits this year. This partnership has been happening for nearly 20 years. So when I look at that number, I just don't see 171 visits. I see what that kind of investment can mean when it's multiplied across two decades, across thousands of families, across generations. The impact doesn't stop there. Next year, the Treehouse will celebrate our 25th anniversary. Over those 25 years, many of the babies that we served have now grown into adults. I've met social workers, teachers, police officers, college students, and even one of my dental hygienists who said, I am a treehouse baby. That's what happens when we invest in families early. We may not always be able to see the full impact today, but years later, we will see the adults that these children are becoming. Much of the success is made possible through partnerships like ours with K-State Research and Extension Office. On behalf of the Treehouse, our staff, and the families we serve, thank you for investing in the prevention and education the K-State Research and Extension Office brings to Sedgwick County families. It's been critical and deeply impactful to thousands of Sedgwick County families. Thank you.

Thank you very much for coming in. Do we have any questions? Okay, thank you very much. Next speaker, Kristen Coates. Okay, not here? Okay. That is all the speakers we have. Again, there will be other opportunities. Did you sign up?

Yeah, I signed up. I signed up right up there.

That's Fire District. I signed up on Fire District. Oh, you signed up on Fire District. Do you want to speak now then?

I told you to sign there.

Okay.

If you would state your address, Les.

Sure, absolutely. Good morning, Sedgwick County Commissioner Celeste Reset, 2239 North T-Time Court. I'm a Wichita native. I grew up here. I'm a former bank examiner, a former chief internal auditor, and a former fraud investigator. Commercial tax incentives are broken. When commercial taxes are not collected, the county loses out, the city loses out, and the school district loses out. Residential homeowners are asked to make up the difference. We are the ones paying for tax giveaways given to developers for industrial revenue bonds. Taxpayers pay for incentives through this broken process. The state of Kansas recently completed an audit on industrial revenue bonds. The results were not good and problems with tax exempt properties were found. Here's what the audit said, and I quote, The Sedgwick County Appraiser's Office didn't submit many IRBX applications to BOTA for approval over the past 30 years as required by state law. 112 were not filed. Poor segregation of duties at the Sedgwick County Appraiser's Office, unclear timelines, and a lack of state agency oversight allowed this situation to happen. This issue could affect some Sedgwick County business property taxes and quality of BOTA's IRBX data. When I read this audit, I became deeply concerned. Concerned because residential homeowners just got a huge increase in their property tax bills. Concerned because you are not keeping the budget revenue neutral, though some of you ran on that campaign promise. Concerned because hardworking families and seniors struggle to keep a roof over their head, yet commercial businesses are getting a free ride on property taxes. I specifically asked a Sedgwick County Commissioner if anyone was concerned about the broken incentive process. I asked if there was an impact to taxpayers for the 112 inaccurately recorded IRB properties. I was told no, there was no impact to taxpayers. I was told in emails and phone calls there was no impact to taxpayers. I was told there was no missed revenue. I decided to find out for myself. Here's a list of all the commercial tax-exempt properties for Wichita. There are businesses who pay no property taxes or pay reduced property taxes, and I selected four to look at. One of them, Poet Ethanol Products, has been receiving industrial revenue bond tax perks since 2004. They have $24 million in appraised values that are tax-exempt. They also received sales tax exemptions on all the furniture and equipment that went into their new offices at 39th and Webb. They got nearly everything they wanted in tax incentives. I found unusual fluctuations in property valuations. Every single time I asked someone in authority if this fluctuation was a mistake, I was told no. There was nothing unusual about the fluctuations in assessed value. I was told all of the 112 exceptions in the state IRB audit, no problems were found, and I quote, to wrongly reduce the county tax base. But I persisted. I faced a lot of pushback as a fraud investigator, and I asked for a meeting to discuss the results I found. Last Thursday in a county meeting, I was told I was right. There was a problem. And contrary to what I had been told in emails and over the phone, there was a fiscal impact to taxpayers. Ethanol Products LLC owes $119,000 in back taxes. They have 45 days to pay. I was told, and I quote, the appraiser made a calculation error in the 2025 value. I do appreciate the acknowledgement of the error. I do not appreciate the pushback I received when I questioned this anomaly. Sedgwick County is not responsible for giving businesses these tax exemptions. The City is. And I spoke at City Council last night and told them to freeze IRBs until this broken process is fixed. I also asked Mayor Liu to get with you, Commissioner Beatty, and discuss this broken system, and I hope she does reach out to you. You all are responsible for putting properties on tax rolls properly. You are responsible for verifying IRBX are filed timely with BOTA. My concern is how the remaining 111 exceptions are going to be reviewed in detail like I did, as I would like to be part of that conversation. So again, I thank you for the acknowledgement of the mistake, but it took a lot of psst, What do I want to say? Stubbornness on my part to push through all the people telling me no problem, nothing wrong, you're mistaken, to get this acknowledgement that yes, out of a small sample of this list I just showed you, $119,000 in back taxes are now due and owing in 45 days. Thank you, commissioners.

Celeste, if you don't mind here, I'll talk to you a little bit. You know, you and I went back and forth a little bit, and I told you that we didn't have any in my conversations. You asked me if there was any financial impact, talked to the county managers, said there wasn't. Tom, has that changed now then? Well, I mean, we understand we have this. Just help me better understand what, because I did tell her that, you know, based on our conversation.

And I wasn't trying to call you out on that.

No, no, no, no. I just want to be open about it.

Yeah. So we talked about this. Brent's going to come and address this, Chairman. We talked about this at staff yesterday, and I think we've got two different problems happening at the same time here. So let me have Brent kind of recap what we talked about in staff yesterday, and then we can have any questions asked.

Okay. I just want to be clear about it because, you know, I wasn't trying to push you back, but I was being told no, we didn't have anything. Got Brent right in here right now? Yeah.

Should I go sit down? Sure. I'm not used to doing this. Good morning.

Again, for the record, Brent Shelton, your Deputy CFO. As we've discussed as we have gone through looking at this issue, When we were reconciling exemptions against reports that were at the state, we found we had a discrepancy. We looked into that discrepancy. There was a pretty sloppy process. There was a good process that wasn't being followed. Let's put it that way. The way that the state verifies these, they would have never seen that things weren't being filed. They were looking internally at their records. We had some additional information, and at the time we discovered this and reported it to you, we were looking at a couple of things. One was Are there any improper exemptions? In other words, exemptions that wouldn't probably have been approved by the Board of Tax Appeals had process been followed. We couldn't find anything. They have gone through proper vetting through the cities that issued these industrial revenue bonds. So to the extent that we think that those would have been approved by the Board of Tax Appeals, no fiscal impact to taxpayers. We then wanted to see if any of them had lasted too long. These are five plus five-year exemptions. Are there any that lasted longer than that? We found a list of those. We looked at those. Those are separate IRBs where we found some that on a given parcel, they lasted longer than 10 years, but it's more than one project. The IRB follows the project. We tax according to the parcel. So two buildings on one parcel, two issues could last. You have some overlap, and they could go longer. We've done thorough investigation, and I think the thing that you need to know going forward is that a lot of process has been put in place that involves a team approach, legal review, appraiser review, and so forth, that we look at these as they come in. They're going through the proper process. A number have been filed with the Board of Tax Appeals this year, and we received those exemption approvals as they've come back. It is true that there was a, as Ms. Reset pointed out, a parcel that there was a clerical error made in assigning the appraised or taxable value and the exempt value. This parcel wasn't getting a free ride. These folks received an industrial revenue bond. They received a partial tax exemption. The amount of tax, taxable real estate, and the amount of exempt real estate were flipped. That resulted in an under-billing of their taxes. When that was discovered, that was corrected, and a bill has been sent to those folks for them to pay. Regardless of the issues that we discussed with the legislative post audit folks, That's a separate issue. That was bad process, bad following of process. This was a clerical error. So I don't want to conflate the two issues and try to say that the whole system is broken or that you should participate in some sort of a moratorium on these. Our role is ministerial. To do it correctly, to apply the exemptions as they're presented, once they're approved by Board of Tax Appeals, that system is fixed going forward. We're looking back to assure that we don't have issues going back. So I can tell you that we're doing the best we can with what we have, and it's now an open, transparent process.

Okay, it sounds like we're good going forward, but I've already told her there's no financial impact from the past, and then she found financial impact in the past. So how do I gain her confidence back in me that she's not going to find any more errors?

Again, from when we were talking about the issue of non-filing with the Board of Tax Appeals, we began to look at things like improper exemptions. the exemptions that shouldn't exist, exemptions that lasted too long. Those would have fiscal impact. We weren't finding any. Subsequent to that, because of the taxable value being flip-flopped with an exempt value on a parcel that happened to be part of this list, there was, at that point in time, an underbilling. That's been fixed. So audits, looking for anomalies after this one was discovered, all of these parcels, not just the ones that haven't been properly filed, improperly filed, but all have been looked at to determine that we don't have clerical errors in those. So it's two different issues. And as I mentioned to you yesterday, this company that got a free ride has paid over $2 million in taxes since they began receiving industrial revenue bonds to finance expansion. Okay. Commissioner Meister?

Brent, thanks for the explanation, or the re-explanation from our discussion yesterday. I think it's important to know that yesterday we asked this clerical error, and Mr. said thank you for assisting in drilling down on some of that stuff. I go back to my days right after college when I worked at a bank. And I was just a 20-something-year-old loan officer, and there was always a cringe when the bank examiners walked in the bank. So I assume you might have got the same cringe feeling when you were talking. So anyway, and I'm saying that respectfully. You know that. But more importantly, so this error that we found that's on the POET deal, that was just this last most recent year. Correct. Previous years that had been calculated correctly.

Right.

Right.

And I think the thing that helped flag that error was that values are posted on our Internet, on our Web site. So she was able to see an anomaly in that. Those are all being looked at by the appraiser's office. So it's an attempt at full transparency here, and an anomaly came up and was fixed.

So then the other thing on the process, so can you also just, yesterday you gave us an example of two of their original properties. property or plants, the impact. I know that IRBs have a hot button to many now. A lot of people don't understand them, which I didn't either when I was first elected, but I do now. But give an example of what you said yesterday to some of the original plants that had IRBs for development, what that impact was so the public understands the net benefit eventually from an IRB. Go ahead.

So in this case, a couple of the parcels that are owned by this company that received incentives for building two of these parcels, prior to any incentives, the total tax revenue was $6.58 on one of them and about $5.50 on the other. That's total tax revenue. We've talked about all the taxing jurisdictions. We got about 22% of that.

So we have 22% of $5 and 22% of $6 on the original IRBs. Then the IRBs are issued.

So one of those parcels now is taxed at a rate of about, I think, $40-some thousand last year. Another one, the specific parcel that we talked about where this error was discovered, they've paid on that parcel almost $2.2 million in revenue, in tax revenue.

$2.2 million. So the parcel, so the pot at the end of the rainbow on the IRB rainbow is that when they expire in 10 years, $5 turned into now over $2 million of revenue. Right. So income, property tax. And that's split with school districts, city, whatever.

Exactly.

Okay.

Thanks for explaining that. Appreciate it. Sure. Commissioner, thank you. And Celeste, thank you for the conversations we've had on this topic. I think we have to have a broader conversation, a public conversation about incentives, their use, public awareness, transparency, dashboards, all of the above. And we have to do that in cooperation with our 20 cities because the county doesn't lead in these. We are administrative in many of these purposes. I'll just say, and I think this is important to acknowledge, number one, the employee that did not follow these processes is no longer employed in central county government. Number two, We appointed a new appraiser that started in January, and in the interview process, we insisted on modernizing this office with technology, innovation, systems, and she gave us a book about that thick of how she plans to do this. She's been in the office for seven months, eight months now, and she's starting to implement these things. The third point is, and I asked this pointedly in the meeting when I said it with Celeste, how do we make sure this can't happen again? And you addressed it then, and you addressed it, she addressed it yesterday. There is now a litany of reinforced processes, systems to where we feel pretty comfortable in what we're doing now, that this is not going to be a mistake, that we're going to allow one individual to have complete reign over a policy, over a process, that now there is a host of oversight to make sure these things get processed correctly. So thank you for that. And if Deanna is watching, thank you for her role in that. And Celeste, thank you for the conversations that we've had. The conversations on incentives are going to continue on, so it'll be fun. Chairman, if I could chime in also just to answer the question that you asked on how we regain trust back.

And Commissioner Beatty just took the words out of my mouth. I've been manager for seven years now. And these appointed offices where you have an appraiser, an election commissioner, row offices who are independently elected officials, The oversight for this appraiser's office should be state of Kansas. They clearly are not doing it. We'll do it for them. And that's what Brent has worked on. That's what Deanna is working on. The clerical error, the displacing of numbers, that human beings are going to make mistakes. What you have to process in and policy in is that two sets of eyes see that. So it's not just one set of eyes. And Commissioner Beatty just touched on that. So that's the fix of the problem. where we had transfixing, a transposing of numbers. The filing of the IRBs with the state, that has also been done by process. That's a simple fix. Should have been going on all these years. We would have hoped that the state would have had oversight, and if they did not, we'll do it. So these issues where we're dealing with State, and Commissioner Howell touched on it before, too, where we have state-run offices that now all of a sudden the county commission seems to be responsible for are problematic in nature. But we'll step up and we'll manage these. So I think to get SLES Trust back on this is we show process change. And in these two instances, we have changed both these processes. Deanna has to modernize them to make sure we're accountable.

Thank you, Brent. SLES, do you feel like we addressed your issues?

Yes, you did, but I'd ask one thing. The pushback I got when I filed CORA's Freedom of Information Requests, the pushback I got when I tried to have conversations about these anomalies, let's be a little more cooperative. I mean, I know I'm not probably a typical citizen looking over your shoulders. I admit that because I was a fraud investigator, to your point, Commissioner Meitzner. But work with me a little bit. I'm really not trying to give you a hard time. I just was sample testing and couldn't believe out of four I looked at, that was, I thought, a big one.

Transparency is a big issue. Thank you. And I want to make sure we are being transparent.

And I wasn't calling you out either.

No, that's fine. That's fine. Okay.

May I make one comment? Yeah, go ahead. Celeste, I just want to make one more comment. I saw your Facebook post, and I just want to say I can't speak for the commission or the Sedgwick County, but I'll speak for myself. I appreciate you being tenacious and digging in and holding us accountable. And I'm sorry we got sideways with each other initially as an organization and as you. And you asked for an apology. I'll just say I apologize for our pride. And we were obviously humbled by your discovery. So thank you for what you've done. Thank you.

Faith, did you want to speak on this agenda as well? Okay. Faith Martin.

Good morning, Faith. Good morning, Faith Martin. I reside in District 5. Happy to see you guys again. I'm going to try to go through this quick because I cannot stay for the rest of the hearing, so I'm going to try to cover everything in five minutes. I appreciate how you basically shouted out staff this morning because staff are what make the county run. It's not the elected officials. It's the appointed people and the staff that work. I would ask that, again, you consider election staff the same way that you would consider the rest of the staff because we were – hundred and something people short for the last election, and then we had to turn around and do a recount at the drop of a hat. And I'm going to tell you, after working the election, working the recount, and working the audit, hand-pulling ballots, no one volunteered. We all got paid because it's hard work, and we're there all day long. Some of us were there for three days. over the weekend. So I would again ask you, and because I'm not going to ask for money without looking for cuts, I'm going to again bring up the WSU mill levy. That's $13 million that we seem to have no political will to do anything about. Also, I'd like to talk to you about something I haven't brought up before, but has been an issue for me is fleet management. Owning and leasing are two very different things. And our fleet management budget for 2026 was over $12 million. So I guess I would ask the county, why aren't we looking at leasing as an opportunity? Because when I went through like a little checklist of should we lease, should we own? Leasing, you only pay a portion of the vehicle you use. There's lower acquisition costs. There's lower monthly payments. Leasing is flexible, especially when you're looking at very specialized vehicles that might come from out of state. When we're looking at vehicles that anyone can buy for whatever, are we purchasing local? Is that money staying in county? Or are we buying things from out of state? Now, if it's a fire engine, obviously, they don't make fire engines in Kansas. But they do make SUVs. They do make a lot of things that we can purchase in Kansas, and the revenue stays in Sedgwick County. We could be doing a lot and taking money out of the $12 million in assets and staffing and maintenance and repair and buildings and everything that we do for fleet maintenance and putting that towards the things that the public is telling you that they actually want. I mean, it's chump change compared to $12 million. We only need $93,000 to give every election worker a tiny bump. I think we're talking, what, $5,000, $6,000, $10,000 for the extension office. There's a lot of things. And saying quality of life is not important and that public safety is. I had this conversation with city council last night about public safety. Public safety is a lot of things that isn't just wearing a badge. Public safety is a lot of things that isn't just the jail. There's a lot of things that go into public safety, making sure that we have mental health care, making sure that we have good schools, making sure that we have education and training and parks and rec and library. All of those things are public safety, lighting, benches. Just saying quality of life doesn't really matter. Well, that's my quality of life. There's not a lot of free third spaces people can go anymore without spending money. And a lot of us don't make $100,000 a year to be able to do whatever we want. We need those spaces to be able to go and have programs and do what we need. So I would encourage this body to spend a little time thinking about what they could support versus what we can't do just because property taxes are high. We all know the system is broken. We don't need that explained to us anymore. Explaining why our bills are high isn't helping us. We want the political will from the League of Counties to go put some pressure on state legislatures to do what we need, not to just explain how a broken system is hurting us. I would also say robbing Peter to pay Paul with a sales tax is not helping anybody. I'm still going to have to pay a sales tax. And if I don't own property, then I'm still going to have to pay a sales tax. So that's not helping anyone either. We need to look at Things that we're doing process-wise that don't make sense. Last year, I said I approved exceeding revenue neutral because I felt like you guys were lean. Well, there's still things that aren't lean on here. I know the jail is running lean, fire is running lean, but fleet management is something I haven't heard anyone from this body talk about. So I see no difference between the tax appraisal and civil asset forfeiture. You're using the force of government to take money from us with processes that are broken. So I would expect on the next legislative agenda that you address civil asset forfeiture, that you address the appraisal process, and you start fighting for your constituents so that we can have the money for the things that we care about. And also I approve exceeding revenue neutral.

Thank you, Faith. Any questions for Faith? Thank you very much. I believe that's all of our public speakers. Is there anyone else that wanted to speak on the public agenda? Again, there's going to be more opportunities to speak here today. Okay. I would like to make a motion to receive and file public agenda.

Second.

We have a motion and a second. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howe.

Aye.

Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Bubba.

Aye. Motion passes 5-0. Next item, please.

Consent agenda.

Tom, what do we got? Good morning, Chairman and Commissioner. Tom Stills, County Manager's Office, recommending approval of consent items B through G on record or agenda. Okay.

Does anyone have any questions on consent items B through G? If not, I would like to make a motion to approve items B through G. Second. We have a motion and a second. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Commissioner Beatty? Aye. Commissioner Hall?

Aye.

Commissioner Weiss? Aye. Chairman Buwa?

Aye. Motion passes 5-0. Next item, please.

New business, item H, public hearing regarding the proposed property tax levy in excess of the revenue neutral rate and adoption of revenue neutral rate resolution for the 2027 Cedric County budget.

Chairman and Commission, good morning. Tom Stolz, County Manager's Office. I'll be up here a number of times in the next few hours. This morning is the first and only required hearing on the recommended budget's proposed property tax levy in excess of revenue neutral rate. The revenue neutral rate mill levy is 25.654 mills. The recommended budget... The recommended budget would be supported with a property tax of $217,672,598, which is approximately equivalent to 26.842 mils. This is the first of two public hearings related to Sedgwick County's recommended budget this morning. This hearing should consider whether the county should exceed the revenue neutral rate upon hearing input from interested taxpayers, while the second hearing should consider amendments to the recommended budget after hearing objections to the same. I recommend you allow interested taxpayers an opportunity to present oral testimony, receive public comment, approve the resolution to levy a property tax rate exceeding the revenue neutral rate, close the public hearing, and receive and file public comments.

At this time, I would like to go ahead and read from the script here just to ensure that we're doing everything appropriately. Before we get into these items, I want to explain the procedures. First, we'll have the revenue neutral rate agenda item, which includes a public hearing and potential action by the board. Then after that is completed, we'll have the next agenda item, which is the public hearing on the 2027 budget. Subsequent to the public's to the budget's public hearing, there's an agenda item for the planned adoption of the budget. Justin, do you have any other comments before I open this up?

I don't. If you'd like me to comment on revenue-neutral rate, I'd be happy to elaborate beyond what Tom's already indicated. Just for transparency. Sure. Happy to do that. Justin Wagner, county councilor. Revenue-neutral rate, or R&Rs, it's going to be referred to several times today, I think, is that it's a state law that was enacted in 2021 legislative session. And what revenue-neutral rate means is that the amount of ad valorem property taxes that a taxing subdivision receives would need to be the same or less to be revenue neutral rate than the prior budget year. And so it does not allow taxing subdivisions to, you're not revenue neutral rate if you even get $1 more than you got the prior year. Does not allow for exceptions for new properties that may have been constructed. Does not allow for exceptions for property improvements or anything along those. Just if there's $1 more received in your budget than the prior year, you're not revenue neutral rate. Under those revenue neutral rate statutes, taxing subdivisions like the county and the fire district must indicate their potential intent to exceed revenue neutral rate on or before July 20th of each year. The Board of County Commissioners did this on July 15th. At that point, as part of that, you also state what your maximum mill levy would be. At that point, as Tom mentioned, it was a recommended maximum of approximately 26.842 mills, which would be a reduction of just a little over 0.7 mills from what your 2026 budget had. So I will point out that regardless of any action the board takes today, you're already, even at the maximum amount you could approve in a budget, you're going to be doing a mill levy reduction from what your 2026 budget was. Tom already read through what the change would be on the numbers, so I'm not going to reiterate that. Because the Board of County Commissioners, the recommended budget from the manager would propose to exceed the revenue neutral rate, the Board of County Commissioners required by state law to hold a public hearing, that's what this agenda item is, for folks to comment on the revenue neutral rate. And if the board would wish to potentially exceed the revenue neutral rate when you make your budget adoption, there would be a need to approve a resolution as part of this agenda item. I'd be happy to stand for any questions. I know Lindsay Poe-Rousseau is also here as your CFO to help if you have any questions before you kick this off, Chairman and Commissioners.

Okay. Does anyone have any questions about the process today? Okay. If not... I'm going to open the public hearing regarding the 2027 Sedgwick County proposed budget property tax levy in excess of the revenue neutral and adoption of revenue neutral resolution. Please note that if you wish to provide oral testimony to the Sedgwick County proposed budget to a levy, to levy a tax in excess of the revenue neutral, this is your opportunity to provide comments. So again, this is the revenue neutral. Tom, you've already spoken. So now I'm beginning the portion of the public hearing that provides interested taxpayers with the opportunity to present oral testimony. Each speaker will be afforded five minutes to provide. So I just ask that you please provide your name and address. And this is the revenue neutral portion. Again, we're going to have another portion over the budget. If anyone would like to speak now regarding revenue neutral.

Good morning, Commission. I'm Mike Durkin, 1818 North Harbor Lake. And there's been a lot of discussion about property taxes. I mean, mine have gone up 32.4% since 2020. I built my house in 2018. It's gone up 60% since then. And I do want to say that generally governing bodies say if we leave the mill levy static, They pat themselves on the back. And that's just wrong. It's just, oh, good, we have money to spend. And so I compliment you that you have not chosen to do that. But I do challenge, I think it's the point in time when government needs to really focus on efficiency The private sector uses lean. That's a term that they use. How do we do more with less? We're not talking about cutting surfaces. We're talking about being more efficient. And I just challenge you guys to start looking to do that. Thank you. Okay. Mr. Meister.

Mike, just thank you for your comments. We have lowered what we've taken, and I think, not to be repetitive to many, but we could have captured 7.5%, 8% growth in the county budget. We can't speak for the school districts and the cities, as you know. And I wish we could be at zero, but the reality, even in business, is- Your medical insurance rates on your employees go up. Your property insurance goes up. You know, there's just about 2% or 3% that just, no matter what business you're in, you get hit with cost of business. You know, the water rates go up, electricity rates. So we've tried to take the approach of what do we need to cover our... inflationary adjustments and then is there anything else that's required and that's how we've been able taking that approach from the start that's why the last four years we've been able to take that approach and say this is what we need we could take this much we're taking what we need and I appreciate that I guess my point being is is that I know and I'm not getting it's frustrating

I just think that there's a lot of services that you offer that there's tons of abuse. How many EMS calls just don't need to be there? How many times is EMS serving a Zuber? That's one simple. And every single area has that. And I'm just saying, we need to really say... How do we focus at providing the services in a very efficient manner and not allowing people to abuse our goodwill?

Okay? Well done. Yeah, we've had cases where somebody calls 911 to go to the hospital just because they didn't want to drive themselves or they wanted to go to this hospital way over here when this hospital was the closest. So there's some... abuse by the citizen abuse. But we're looking into a lot of things that we've been doing the last three, four years, pretty serious, 9-1-1-ish type of stuff and staffing so we can help control this. But I appreciate your comments and I just wanted to re-explain things.

I compliment you guys.

Yeah, I'm not being critical.

The Senate of Government says if I left the mill, I would get the same patent.

I know, I know. And that's malarkey. I was a little guilty of that when I was at the city.

The city did that this year. I saw that.

We saw that. Thank you for your comments.

Again, we're on the revenue neutral. Is there anyone else that would like to provide testimony during this public hearing for the revenue neutral? Sir, please state your name and address.

My name is Hayden Davis. Address 1046 South Kansas Avenue. I don't live very far away from here. I was kind of shocked, like as much as everybody else here, to see a 60% increase in property taxes for me. I'm a single-income home, just trying to provide for my family, and I'm getting squeezed out. It's kind of hard because it's my first home. Bought for the VA. It's not very... I'm not in a nice neighborhood by any stretch of the imagination. Sorry. Hard time waking up this morning. No, I just had a hard time... Reckless on the idea that there needs to be a 60% increase when... I live in a pretty rough neighborhood. And I just see homeless people, vibrancy. What was it, last month I see a man just a block away from my house, exposing himself in the middle of the street while I'm trying to just go to work. I just don't think that this is justifiable, especially for a house I've sacrificed my life over. And if – because, like, if – you know, what I'm worried about is, like, if this is a 60%, you know, increase next year, then here's to say it's not another one the year after and the year after and just kind of snowball to the point where I'm priced out of living in, you know, the town I, you know, born and raised in. And I don't want to move, but if, you know, more or less if, you know, we're just going to keep getting squeezed, I'll move because I'm not going to, you know, sell my house and move into an apartment. Right. That just wouldn't be fair for me and any Kansas veteran.

Amen. Thank you. So I just want to understand, you're right, you're more frustrated with the valuation of your property than you are taxes, correct? Correct. Okay. I'm curious, you just recently bought it. How close is your valuation to what you paid for it?

We're looking at about maybe $20,000 off. Over? Yeah. Okay. See, that's a big deal. It is a big deal. Did you file an appeal? I'm a current member of the Kansas Army National Guard. I have been on and off on military orders for the greater part of the year, so I didn't see that piece of mail until it was too late.

Okay. I think you do have an opportunity still to pay under protest at the end of the year. So I would encourage you to follow through with that process and show the evidence that you just purchased the property for $20,000. You were taxed $20,000 more than what you just paid for the property. And this is something I'm seeing a lot of, and especially in areas of lower property value sales is the increase. Yeah.

It's just one of them deals for me. I just don't see the value of where I live versus what is being evaluated. I'm being evaluated for somewhere real nice on the west side. I'm in smack dab off of Central and Lincoln.

Well, it is an issue, and I plan to keep pushing it until we address to make sure that we are accurate with what sales values are. Commissioner, how are you doing?

Thank you, Chairman. I just wanted to clarify, what year did you buy your home? 2024. So the $20,000, was that over two years, or is that one year change?

So what was proposed on this is like... From previous tax years, from this year, we're talking like $60,000, and obviously what I paid for is not at all what was previously shown, but now it's even way more overvalued than what I even paid for, and I imagine that my house value did not go up that much.

I'm just trying to get some details here. So you said earlier 60% increase. So what it was before you bought it to what it is today?

It's 60% shown from what's here on this piece of mail. Okay. But as in terms of what I paid for it and what's also being sent, it's still even too high.

So from 25 to 26, you had a 60% increase in your valuation? Yes, sir. Okay. And right now it's about $20,000 above what you paid for it two years ago? Yes, sir. Okay. I don't know if you can do this or not, but I would ask you to maybe make sure that we have your address and phone number so I can research that and contact you back. There's staff in the back of the room. Make sure that they have your contact info. Okay. I like these kinds of cases because it helps me understand exactly what people are dealing with.

I understand paying your fair share in taxes, and this is well within working pretty tight with my budget, especially the way it thinks the economy is. I just think that this is a bit much.

I'm not sure if somebody already asked that. Did you make an appeal this year?

I was unable to because I was on and off on military orders from earlier this year, and I haven't been able to. By the time I saw that piece of mail, it's already kind of been too late. Well, thank you for your testimony.

Appreciate it. Thanks for coming in and speaking this morning. I appreciate it. Would anyone else like to speak on the revenue-neutral part of the budget? Last call. Are there any additional individuals that would like to provide testimony? No. Seeing none, the board has now heard the interest of taxpayers on the proposed budget property tax levy in excess of the revenue neutral rate. Are there any comments or questions from the commissioners regarding this matter? Commissioner Meitzner. Just a quick comment.

This revenue neutral rate... I know it was, Commissioner, how you might tell. When was that required from the state for us to do? About three years ago?

It was Senate Bill 13. It was 2021 is when it became law. They debated this a year before that.

Okay, so I think we've kind of explained what it is. The irony is, which I just learned this year attending a conference, so I'm not making this up. I'm quoting somebody else. So there's 4,000 plus taxing jurisdictions in the state of Kansas. I think in Sedgwick County, we have 170. That's cemeteries, water districts. So statewide, there's 4,000 taxing jurisdictions that are required to do a revenue neutral rate hearing like we're doing. There's one taxing jurisdiction that is not required to do an RNR, and that's the state government. The state budget is not required, but they have told us, all of us, to do this. The irony also is that the appraised values are sent out in March, I think, yeah, March, and that creates quite a flurry of activity regarding, and it all comes at the county because we have the county logo on it, even though we're 22% of the tax or the appraised value. So that's a different story. But the irony that we have to send out six months later, because I've had three conversations with really smart people that have said, I got my property tax bill again in the mail. And I'm saying, no, it's your revenue neutral rate required notice. So we are required to remind every citizen twice a year what your appraised value goes up. We may as well make it quarterly. Let's just let everybody know every other month that, hey, here's your property tax. That's how bad this notice stuff is. I wish that the state would also, if some of you that have an income, you ought to look at how much your state income tax is that's deducted from your check every paycheck or maybe you pay quarterly estimates, whatever. and compare how much personal income tax you pay to the state of Kansas. And I wish the state of Kansas would send out a letter to every taxpayer at the end of the year or at the beginning of the next year saying, this is how much you paid last year. Just a reminder that not how much, but in April 15th, it's a reminder that your taxes are due. And you could compare what you're paying in income taxes to what, and we hear nothing. Nobody complains to us or anybody about a state income tax. So this is obviously it's something that hits me dear and dear, the notices, the requirement. They're the only taxing agency that does not have to do an R&R, and I promise you their budget goes up just fine every year. not just fine it just goes up so i'm getting off my horse and that's my rnr lecture for for the last two minutes thank you for that commissioners any other questions or comments

If not, I would like to move that the Board of County Commissioners adopts the resolution to approve exceeding the revenue neutral rate.

Second.

Okay. We have a motion and a second. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Mady.

Aye.

Commissioner Howe. Aye. Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Bubba.

Aye. And the resolution has been approved by a vote of 5-0. With that action being taken, I will now close the public hearing. And I will move to, now I'm making a motion to receive and file the comments made during the public hearing.

Second.

Okay, I have a motion and a second. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howe. Aye. Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Blubaugh.

Aye. And this motion passes 5-0. And now this particular agenda item is closed. So, Madam Clerk, next item, please.

Item I, public hearing regarding the 2027 Sedgwick County budget.

Chairman and Commission, Tom Stoltz again, County Manager. This morning is the second public hearing for the 2027 recommended budget. Sedgwick County's recommended operating budget totaled $624,195,119. This budget will be supported with a property tax levy of $217,672,598. which is approximately equivalent to 26.842 mils based on the estimated assessed valuation and subject to technical adjustments. I recommend you allow interested taxpayers an opportunity to present oral testimony, receive public comment, close the public hearing once it's over, and receive and file public comment.

Okay. I do want to ask commissioners, I've been here two hours, I imagine we're going to get into some lengthy discussion. Do you guys want five minutes for restroom break? Please. Okay. We're going to take a five-minute recess, and then we'll jump into that. Start going again, guys. I want to wait for Commissioner Howell. You need to wait on your clerk.

We got to vet him.

We got to vet him.

All right, we'll go ahead and bring the meeting back to order again. So Tom, I appreciate you coming up there and speaking. So I guess now we will open the public hearing. for the budget. So this is on the budget, not the R&R. We're opening this for public comments. Anyone, whether you spoke today or not, you can come up here and you can speak regarding our budget. Okay. Just state your name and address, please.

Mike Betzen, 19223 West 29th Street. Good to see you again. I'm actually talking for John Hecht. He can't make it for other reasons. And he lives at 2942 Cardington Court. So this is about the extension office and a couple other real quick items. And this is from John. Just a quick history. In 1862, the Morrill Act was passed, and part of it was established of the land-grant universities. The purpose of it was to make higher education accessible to the people. Kansas State was established in 1863 for this purpose. Extension of the county agents we have across the state are an arm of the university system that brings this information to the people. The local county agents that we have here and other counties across are paid partially by the state and partially by the county, as we all know. In agriculture, these agents take applied research done by the university and help people in the ag industry apply it to their businesses. This research can be on many things, fertilizer types, use rates, insect identification. assess insect damage, insecticide use rates, levels of damage, and when to treat diseases and when they become a problem, livestock production and problems, and as you've heard this morning, supporting programs such as 4-H, which is more than just for the country and the farm folks. Companies that supply inputs for the ag as well as the people who use these all rely on some level of the extension office system for unbiased results and directions on trends in the business. They need and use this information that the university and local agents supply. There's quite a lot of information and research that is developed by the university system that local agents have access to and help people with. I'm trying to show there is local county agents have a large impact on the counties they live and work in. Also understand the conditions change and that one county needs may be different from another, hence the need for an agent in each county. These agents are like anyone else as they will go and work where they can be compensated well for their efforts. Even though Sedgwick County has a large urban population compared to other counties, it has some of the best farmland in the state. And if you remember some of the studies we've shown on the data center discussions. Agriculture is one of the top producers of income in the state, and it needs continuous support from local governments to keep ag industry in Sedgwick County profitable. Food production is and will continue to be one of the most important things. We can use the land that we have. It's not always flashy, but it's essential for our way of life and our community. We understand you're in a tough position handling taxes, handling budgets. I personally had to do that too. Budget's actually bigger than this, but they were always fun. One thing I've learned too is an organization can become very ineffective by a thousand cuts. Just a little bit incremental, we can suffer here, we can go here, and then pretty soon, I call it the law of incrementalization. Pretty soon when you look back, you say, how did I ever end up here? And once when the community needs you, you may not be able to supply it. So that's just a caution. You've got to watch that because it does happen all the time. It's not flashy, but it's important. And it's not just for the farmers. It's for the city and for everything else. Now, this is Mike Bettson talking, not John, okay? And it's going to become more important in the next few years because you're wrestling with it. It's going to be water. And that water usage by everybody is going to have to change. We're going to have to educate. We're going to have to learn to live differently. It isn't going to be just the farmers or the rural folks. It's going to be everybody. And if you look at the city of Wichita's average usage of 11,000 gallons a month for a family versus the statewide is 6,600. Those things start to beg questions. You've got to start asking them. So, you know, the Extension Office does hundreds of services. Soil samples, water testing. I think you said 800 water tests in a year, something like that. Maybe that was a soil sample. Okay. But they're going to have to educate you about how you're going to change how you're using the water. What are going to be your different plants, crops, things like that? How do you keep people educated a little bit about where does your food really come from? That's the kind of stuff I'm going to do. You've got a tough job. I understand that. Now, for the transparency, and the lady talked about it, and I wouldn't want her on my tail as an auditor. She's tenacious. Going forward, and Tom, you know I've talked about this a little bit, it would be good if you could... put out a list of forecasted what the tax incentives you provided and what you could have had but you won't get. You know, basically, what have you foregone on taxes that you could have had with your IRBs, star bonds, everything that's going on in Kansas. That's a bit of transparency. It's going to open up questions, but that's the fun part of your job. You get to deal with that. I think that would be very valuable because I'm probably one of the few people who read that audit. I've studied it, and it's got problems. So I would suggest you forego it by year, by industry, who's getting what.

Okay? Okay. Thank you. Anyone got any questions for Mike? Or John. Or John.

Okay.

Thank you very much. Thank you. OK. Next speaker, please. Good morning.

Good morning. My name is Susie Klossmeyer. My address is 11705 East 31st Street South. I am here on support of 4-H and the 4-H program in Cedric County. Most people say guns and kids don't mix. Well, I'm going to tell you they do mix if they're in the right environment and we're teaching them safety and controlled use of them. I am the volunteer county coordinator for Cedric County 4-H shooting sports, and I'm an instructor in many disciplines, a role I never thought I'd see myself in. But it was my kids' passion, and so I took it and I learned with them. That's great. As a lifelong 4-H member, I grew up in 4-H. I knew I wanted to get my own children involved in the program. When my oldest turned seven, we searched for a club for him to join. We joined in East Wichita because that's where we lived. He was interested in rocketry, geology, and woodworking. 4-H had a place for all of these for him. My husband and I also started volunteering and becoming involved. We saw the fruits of the older members helping and mentoring the younger members. As my son William got older, he wanted to try the shooting sports program. I didn't grow up around guns, but I trusted 4-H and we got involved. The volunteer leaders were patient with him and taught him things that I didn't know and helped us grow. When my daughter Emma turned seven, she joined 4-H. She was involved in cooking, sewing, rocketry, and arts and crafts. She wanted to start shooting and I laughed at her. She couldn't sit still for a minute and she was the active one of the family. And I cautioned her, I said, I don't think you can be successful at this. But guess what? She was. She has marksman skills that she competed at the local, the state, and the national level. She became an apprentice instructor, which our instructors in 4-H shooting sports go through a weekend training. She went through the same training so she could mentor the younger people in our club. And she's only one of the success stories that I've seen and coached in my years. In 2012, I began volunteering in the program. In the past 14 years, I've seen the many successes. The priorities of shooting sports in 4-H are safety, positive youth development. Whether we utilize a bow and arrow or a gun as a tool, we help these youth gain the skills they need to grow into the best adults that they can be. They are taught citizenship, goal setting, leadership, perseverance, and so many other skills through this program. In Sedgwick County, we include seven different projects in our program. We have BB gun, air rifle, .22 rifle, air pistol, .22 pistol, shotgun and archery. I have to write them down and count them on my fingers. We also have a young man who's competing in muzzle loading with another county because we don't have a muzzle loading instructor in our county. And we're trying to get the hunting skills program going in our county as well. We have 51 youth just in shooting sports in 4-H in Sedgwick County. All of them are enrolled in at least one project, many of them in multiple ones. Youth are allowed to explore lifetime sports, learn about wildlife and conservation, and compete at local, state, and national level. Kansas 4-H won the National 4-H Shooting Sports Competition this summer. We have in Cedric County alone 17 volunteer instructors. Two of them are youth apprentice ones that have gone through the same training. So they're currently under 21 and they're working with the program. Last year, these instructors donated almost 4,000 hours of volunteer time. And I can't imagine how much of their own money they put into it for gas, going to matches, helping the kids, hotel rooms if you're overnight, those kind of things. When I started the program in 2012, the Extension Office budget allowed us to pay 50% of our instructor training. It's $250, roughly, plus hotels for a weekend to get trained to be a certified instructor. Well, due to cuts in funding, I'm now struggling to help my instructors and getting more instructors as kids age out. Our instructors are wanting to age out with their kids. So we do fundraising in my club, but it was always nice to have that money from the county to help. Our kids in shooting sports are trained to be good citizens. We always know that Sedgwick County kids are going to be helping clean up after matches, even if it's not our match. And we help support the ranges that we shoot at. We help build their infrastructure. So between this and the county fair where we showcased our shooting sports program this year, this is a place for some of our kids who don't have the ways to do sports. This is their sport and where they can bond and have their family. Thank you.

Thank you so much for coming in here this morning. I just want to verify or clarify a couple things. What is the expense? I mean, you guys endure most of the expense yourself, right? Like all these clubs, they have a treasurer, they have bank accounts, but it's money they raise, correct? I mean, it's not government funded.

Right, right. We do a lot of fundraising, especially in the shooting sports program. For a kid to go to Nationals, at the 4-H Nationals, it's over $200 just for its entry fee. Plus, they're in Nebraska for a week, so you have... travel expenses, you have the guns that they shoot are not just what I would go to Shields or Cabela's to get off the shelf. It's high-quality equipment. So we raise the money, and the parents fork over a lot, too.

So you guys were number one in the United States. Yes, we were. So congratulations on that. Thank you. But was there any funding outside of the training that you received?

Just what we raise on our own. I have applied for NRA grants and other grants. Our archery program did get a grant a couple years ago to help replace some of our aging equipment. It's just really hard because there's a lot of people who want the money, just like you guys. Okay.

Any other questions? Okay. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Next speaker, please. And each speaker does have five minutes. I know we mentioned that in the other hearing, but I just want to make sure that if you would just state your name and address. Good morning. How are you? Morning. Good.

What's the point? Why keep going? Hello. My name is Isaac Klossmeyer. I live at 11705 East 31st Street South. I'm 17 years old, and I'm proud to call Sedgwick County my home. A vital part of this home for me and many other youth is 4-H. Now, 4-H has always been a part of my life, from tagging along with my mom and my siblings through meetings and practices, to attending national 4-H events, to today, being able to talk about 4-H, this thing I love, in front of you. But 4-H didn't become a vital part of my life or a lifestyle for me until after my eighth grade year. This year was a bit of a dark year for me. I struggled with depression and suicidal thoughts. I found myself waking up, asking, what's the point? Why keep going? I struggled to see the joy in the little activities I did. I began to dread them. And occasionally, 4-H and shooting sports would fall into this category. But that's not because of what 4-H and shooting sports was. And in fact, 4-H is what helps drag me out of this mindset. I remember one day after a normal weekly practice we have for shooting sports. After each practice, my team and I, we would all get out, go out and get ice cream. I remember sitting in a booth, eating my ice cream, talking with them and joking with them and realizing for the first time in a long time, I truly found joy in this. I realized I had a family here. 4-H was my spark and is a large part of why I am able to stand in front of you today. It is through 4-H that I learned to keep pushing. I learned that it's okay to ask for help. I've also learned public speaking and leadership skills. 4-H has formed me from my head and my heart to my hands and my health. I can't imagine what it could do for other youth. Thank you.

Thank you so much for sharing your personal story. And thanks for, you know, just continuing doing what you're doing and moving forward. I mean, it's tough being a kid. I would not want to do it again, especially in the world that you guys are in now. So I certainly commend that. So especially coming out here and addressing us. Commissioner, do you have any questions? Thank you very much. Next speaker, please.

Joseph Neville, 24600 West 21st Street North, Goddard, Kansas. Glad I'm in these chairs today, not yours for budget talks. I'm here to ask you to support increased funding for the Sedgwick County Extension Office. From the perspective of a young farmer in western Sedgwick County, I think that the investment is important. For me, Extension is not just an office or another government program. It is a resource I actually use. I use extension resources for soil testing, weed plot data, land lease agreements, rental rates for ground and equipment, crop budget projections, and chemical and weed control recommendations. Those resources help me make real decisions that affect my farm and my bottom line. One of the biggest things Extension provides is something that is becoming harder to find, trusted, unbiased information. We live in a world where we can Google almost anything. We have AI, social media, and thousands of websites telling us what we should do. But just because something shows up in a Google search doesn't mean it's accurate. It is becoming even more important to having organizations we know we can trust to provide research-based information. When I look at an extension recommendation, I know there is research behind it. I know it isn't simply somebody trying to sell me a product. Another example that is especially important to me is the local wheat plots. Kansas is a big state. What works in western Kansas doesn't necessarily work in central or eastern Kansas, and even within Sedgwick County. Soils, weather, and disease pressure can vary considerably. That's why local data matters. If I'm trying to decide what wheat variety to plant, I don't just want to know how variety performs somewhere else in Kansas. I want to know how it performed under conditions that are as close as possible to mine. I'm grateful that Extension has recognized the value of those local wheat plots for many years. That is valuable research that directly affects the profitability of local farms, and the economic impact can add up very quickly. According to the 2022 USDA Census of Agriculture, Sedgwick County had 153,000 acres of wheat and more than 175 million in total agriculture products sold that year. Let's take the wheat number alone. If local research and information help producers improve their average yield by just one bushel per acre, And cash price today is $7, but I like my numbers conservative. We use $6 wheat as an example. That would represent over $921,000 in additional wheat production in Sedgwick County. That's more than $200,000 above the Extension Office's current annual budget. I'm not saying Extension can guarantee that one bushel increase. I'm saying that number illustrates the scale of agriculture we're talking about. and the potential return that is relatively small improvement can have. Wheat is obviously not the only crop grown in our county. If we're going to have young people stay in agriculture and continue farming in Sedgwick County, we need to give them access to the best information we can. When we're talking about increasing the extension budget, I don't look at it as simply spending more taxpayer money. I look at it as investing in a resource that helps people make better decisions, improves the productivity of local businesses, supports producers, and keeps money moving through our local economy. That is a Central County agriculture generated more than $175 million in agriculture product sales in 2022. That's a significant part of our local economy, and I believe it deserves a strong local extension program. I would encourage the commissioners to think about extension not just as what it costs the county, but what it helps the county accomplish. I strongly support increasing funding for the Central County Extension Office, and I hope you support that investment as well.

Thank you. Thank you so much. I just want to reiterate again. You said a one bushel increase will drive almost a million dollars in Sedgwick County. That's a pretty strong number.

A lot of it depends on the weather from the good Lord.

Right, right. Out of my hands. And I appreciate the feedback also. There's not a... You don't have a lot of other unbiased avenues to resort to that's not trying to sell you something, not trying to upgrade you something, not trying to. So definitely appreciate that. Commissioner Wise.

Yes, thank you for speaking. I think we've heard a lot of really good testimony on Extension Center today, but I think this is the most helpful because this is the unseen and really intangible side of what Extension does. So I just really appreciate you coming up here because it is something that we need to better understand how Extension supports you, and that's what we've been asking for. So just thank you for stepping up and giving us a different perspective to consider.

Of course. Thank you. Commissioner Beatty. Mr. Neville, appreciate you, sir. You're pretty involved in Farm Bureau. Yes, sir. This Farm Bureau, Sedgwick County Farm Bureau's got a pretty healthy balance sheet. I love those guys.

Do they support the Extension Center in any way in any of this programming?

Do we know? Yes, sir. You know what? I knew you knew, so I'm trying to figure out the overlap of how much invested in. Because the ag programming and the educational piece of it, it is very valuable. How much does Sedgwick County Farm Bureau, do you know how much they're investing in the program? Dollar-wise, I don't. Volunteer-wise and efforts, we always are happy to team up with Extension and afford that. That education is important. I know such a county farm bureau. They do a lot around here. There's a lot of opportunities. There's a lot of opportunities. I know you're deeply involved in your family farm. How old is your family farm? 120-ish years or something. You guys know what you're doing. We appreciate you a lot, man. We like to think so.

It's very humbling when the weather doesn't cooperate, though. But thank you. Any other questions? Okay. Thank you very much. Next speaker, please. Actually, Kelly, why don't you come up here and answer some of these questions? The topics come up a lot about partnerships and fundraising and Farm Bureau. Maybe help clarify some of that for us, if you could, please.

Thank you, Commissioners. Kelly Anderson, Director of the Sedgwick County Extension Education Center at 7001 West 21st Street North. I'd like to start off, can I provide a few comments and then address some of those issues. I want to thank you for the opportunity to speak today about the return on investment that Extension provides to Sedgwick County. I should have got with Joseph and Mike beforehand because they took half of my speech, but that's okay. So that gives me a little more time to expand on a few things. Today, anyone can find information on Google, TikTok, Facebook, and millions of other news outlets. But what Extension provides is different. We take research and apply it locally through trusted Extension professionals who understand this community. A search engine can give a farmer hundreds of answers about wheat varieties. But here in Sedgwick County, Jeff Seiler, our ag agent, plants 168 different wheat plots at multiple locations across Sedgwick County so that our producers can see which varieties perform best under our conditions and make decisions that affect their profitability. Those decisions matter beyond the farm. When our producers are profitable, those dollars circulate through local businesses, property taxes, schools, and communities. Information is abundant, but trusted research-based information interpreted by someone who understands you, your operation, your community, your values, and your circumstances is far more valuable. An extension is accountable for demonstrating that value. Yesterday, I asked our family and consumer sciences agents and our 4-H agents to pull all of their verified program data from 2025 through 2026. During that one and a half year period, this is just our family and consumer science and 4-H data alone, not agriculture and horticulture data. During that time period alone, we provided direct educational programs to 15,859 people. That's not Facebook likes. That's not newsletter views. That's direct educational programs to 18,859 people. Among them, 2,922 identified as Hispanic or Latino, 1,100 identified as Black, or African American, 290 identified as Native American, and 213 identified as Asian or Pacific Islander. Last year alone, our educators taught 211 programs in 40 area schools at little or no cost to those schools. So when I tell you that Extension works in every district in this county, in every community, in every population, among every ethnicity, among every age, and among every economic circumstance, I mean it. We are different than TCAM. We are different than the Sedgwick County Zoo. We are different than Exploration Place, even though you lump us into the community development bucket. Unlike those places, we don't charge an entry fee to enter our doors. At all. And we very rarely charge for a program. Unlike those places, we don't have massive teams of marketing and fundraising development professionals. To make our programs possible, my nine agents continually maximize the funding provided by the county through grants and partnerships. So far in 2026 alone, they've secured $86,000 in grants and private support to do the work that they do. And so I've heard the question asked many times today. What is Extension doing to help itself? Why aren't you fundraising more? Where's that on the website? My response to you is this. My agents were hired to be educators in agriculture, horticulture, nutrition, youth development, family finances, and other disciplines. And every single hour that they have to spend fundraising is an hour that they're not developing and delivering the work that taxpayers hired them to do. We support a $175 million agriculture economy. We give young people opportunities to develop belonging, leadership, and workforce skills. We teach parents about safe sleep and child development and family budgeting. We help older adults navigate Medicare And we mobilize volunteers to support this work. And we partner with more than 100 area organizations like Treehouse, Senior Citizen Centers, and Habitat for Humanity to meet these residents where they are with education, compassion, a helping hand, and resources that create upward mobility. I would argue that no other organization in Sedgwick County, not TCAM, not Exploration Place, the zoo, provides more information across different subject areas to rural and urban populations at no cost. I'll finish with this. I know that each of you cares deeply about the people you represent. I see it when Commissioner Howell asks tough questions and digs into data. When Commissioner Wise listens thoughtfully, when Commissioner Beatty ensures that all voices are heard, when Commissioner Meitzner provides context through the lens of economic development, and when Chairman Blubaugh looks for compromise and a path forward. For 112 years, Sedgwick County government and Extension have worked together to serve people. We've returned that investment in stronger people, stronger communities, and millions of dollars in public value. I'm grateful for your investment. I'm grateful to serve alongside you. And I'm excited about the opportunity to strengthen that partnership. I'm asking you today to restore our $825,000 in funding. And I want you to give us the capacity to do our jobs. And we will keep delivering on that promise. Thank you.

Kelly, thank you very much for coming in this morning. And we may have more questions for you as we close out the public hearing here. But I really appreciate everything you're doing and everything you're leveraging there. So any questions, commissioners? Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Next speaker, please. Any other speakers? Okay. If not at this time, I plan to close the public hearing, and I would like to make a motion to receive and file public comment.

Second.

I have a motion and a second. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner.

Mr. Chairman, if you could, I'd like to ask Kelly a couple of questions. Sure, sure. I'm sorry, I didn't see your line. That's all right. We could do that. Thank you, Commissioner. Hi, Kelly. Thanks, obviously, for everything you all do. Last night you sent me an email with a number of attachments rather late. Sorry, I missed it. Part of it was one of the attachments was your contract between county commissioners and the Extension Council. It was dated September of 2018 and renews. Is this the current contract?

It has been. That is the base of the current contract. It has renewed every three years since that time. And so we actually have received a new contract from county that we will be signing and returning shortly. But that is the... No... Amendments that have made, and there's been no changes to the contract since 2018.

So it's substantially the same? Yes. Okay. So I was reading it, and I think it seems like there's a feeling that Sedgwick County does not fund and support at the levels that you all were asking for, the $800,000 and some thousand. But I just want to point out, That in this contract, there's four sections I just want to point out. Utilities. The county shall pay all deposits and charges for electricity, gas, water, sewer, trash furnished to the extension center. Yes. So besides the 800 that you're requesting, the county already does this, has done it for years. Yes. Per 12, the county shall be responsible for the upkeep of the buildings, the grounds, the parking areas comprising the facilities.

That's correct.

There's only two more. There's a lot of sections, but there's only four. Ownership of the property, all land and buildings, whether heretofore or hereafter, for the next term agreement, shall remain in the ownership of the county. So the county owns everything, and we maintain it, and we pay all the utilities. Insurance. The county is self-insured and will replace, repair, provide necessary housing for the Extension Council should it be deemed necessary due to storm, fire, or other causes. So I know you know this, but I thought it's worth mentioning because there's been a feeling that we don't do anything. I think that's not a correct overall picture.

And I apologize if I have given that impression to you as a commissioner. We are grateful for the facility provided to us. And when I say provided to us, I think that's actually the wrong way to think about that. It's your facility that we lease as the educational arm of Sedgwick County. Your logo is the logo on the building, not the K-State logo, the Sedgwick County logo. And so what I'm asking and what we're wanting is a deeper partnership and the recognition cognizance, to be recognized for the work that we're doing and being asked to do more with the population of Sedgwick County at a much lower rate than we had previously been for for 10 years previously. And so I don't take lightly the financial obligation that Sedgwick County has in our building and allowing us to do that work. It's just that we are being asked to do even more and provide more services. And the value we provide, I believe, has only gone up while our appropriation has gone down.

Okay. Secondly, well, first of all, I'm really happy that finally we are receiving information about the operation, the budgets. I saw in the contract you're supposed to give a quarterly report, including budget and the status, so I don't know that we've had that quarterly. That said, you've also kind of mentioned now a little bit of a crossroads. The budget as proposed is $705,000-ish, and you're asking for $120,000 to help. And in the other document you sent me, my observation, and I don't know your business as well as you do, But apparently 120,000 will help you rebuild essential staffing capacity. It will provide you, in your words, a dedicated marketing, social media, and events position. It will hire a full-time 4-H program assistant to expand your ability to provide hands-on education. It will restore funding, would allow strategic upgrades to facility equipment. And number five, a portion of will restore funding would be invested in staff compensation. So you're saying, I don't know, I didn't put any numbers to this, but $120,000 will allow you to do all of those five things. Is that what you're saying in this document that you provided me last night?

The words that I use would support those four strategic investments. I believe I also, in some conversations I had with Chairman Blubaugh, I characterized those as four strategic investments we would consider should we receive this funding. They're what I believe is needed to help us be a more effective extension unit, but I will also say that there are 12 elected officials, 12 elected extension council members, and a nine-member executive board that directs the work that we do. And so while I believe, and with their input, that those are our four strategic investments. Those are things that would, one, need to be weighed in on by the public because we're a public entity, and they would need to be supported by our Extension Council through a vote on how we would spend that increase.

Okay. Thanks for the explanation. Mm-hmm. So... Just again, receiving all this information yesterday for the first time and then last night late for subsequent stuff, to come up with a decision here 12 hours later, I don't take those decisions lightly, obviously. The big, a big, big question I have is how do we separate out the value that Sedgwick County contributes, including all the things I mentioned, plus money, plus whatever else we do, versus the logo that's about everywhere except maybe on the main entrance of K-State. And it's even referred to in one of your emails, the K-State Extension Center. So it's the brand... is at least equally, if not more, K-State. So how can we do a total comparison of what K-State provides versus what we supply for the shared brand. And that's where I struggle with how can we get there in an honest, open dialogue of factual information.

Definitely. One of the documents that had been requested by the Sedgwick County Finance Department was a breakdown of other counties' funding levels and what level of appropriation was also provided by K-State, and I believe you had a chance to review that in your meeting yesterday morning. And I think that's when you take a look at those other counties, I think you start to see some trends emerge in terms of how Sedgwick County is funded. And one of the things I've been exploring in my eight months on the job is how counties like Johnson County, for example, who is most comparable to Sedgwick County in terms of population and in terms of the size of their extension department, Their current county appropriation from Johnson County County Commissioners is right at about $1.07 million in their county appropriation. And what they do is on every single piece of marketing material they provide and every single email signature in their branding of the building, They co-brand that with the Johnson County logo and their extension logo. And they even have a tagline in partnership with. And so what you may not know is that Sedgwick County, or our K-State Extension Office, currently my email is kellycanderson at ksu.edu. Here in about three weeks, that's all changing for us. We are all moving to sedgwick.gov email addresses at our at the K-State, at our office. And so we are steadily moving towards a much stronger co-brand with Sedgwick County, and it's something I've discussed with Nicole Gibbs in how we better co-brand those programs together so that we are seen as that one and the same entity in partnership together serving our citizens.

Does K-State... provide all this, all these, whatever K-State provides to us, does K-State provide all of that to all of these counties?

Yes, they do. There's a funding formula for every single county or district so that it's... you know, equal across the board. And so there's a funding formula for each county and district.

Is that public information that we can see the funding formula?

Yes, it is. I'd be happy to provide that to you.

Okay. All right.

That's all my questions at this time. Thank you. Before I turn it over to Commissioner Howell, I wanted to talk a little bit about facilities. Kelly, I don't know if you can answer this or Justin can, but it's my understanding every county in the state of Kansas provides a facility for extension. Is that correct? I mean, that's not a special favor we're doing for you necessarily, right?

That is correct. In fact, I don't know the exact number, but I would take a very educated guess that about 95% of county extension offices are generally housed in the county courthouse or the main government building. I know from my experience growing up, my county extension office was across the hallway from the sheriff and down from the county appraiser. And I would bet that most county extension offices... In Kansas, follow that same model as well. In many ways, they are seen as members of the county government entity and partners in that way and are housed in the county government building.

Is that a legal requirement? Justin, do you know what the relationship is there?

Yeah, Chairman, Justin Wagner, County Councilor, happy to address that. Under state law, counties do have, and Sedgwick County is not unique in this regard, do have a duty to appropriate funds to extension centers. The statute doesn't say the amount of that. That's subject to the discretion of the board. I don't believe the statute says that a space has to be provided. That's what Sedgwick County has done historically, as I think Kelly accurately summarized. So that's just background, but I don't believe the statutes get that specific. I'll check a little bit more, and if I see anything to the contrary, I'll push my button and chime in. Okay.

And one other thing, Kelly, I think it was a little bit of a shocker yesterday when it came up to some of your deferred maintenance items, because I don't think that the commission really understood that. I don't think you were really asking for an additional request. It was just some housekeeping issues that you had in the building. Is that correct?

That is correct. So, as Commissioner Meitzner shared under our agreement in number 12, care and maintenance, you know, it states the county shall be responsible for the upkeep of the building, grounds, parking areas. to include upkeep of permanent fixtures, part of the building structure, such as paint, carpet, light bulbs, et cetera, are the responsibility of the county. And one of the things that I can be honest about that we struggle with is the aging of this facility and its upkeep. And while we're incredibly grateful for what county facilities management provides, we have an aging building that is continuing to show its age and has a very long list of of both short-term and long-term upgrades needed. We're starting to see those issues affect our bottom line. In fact, from May 26th to about July 8th of this year, We had very limited air conditioning in the building because we couldn't get an HVAC person from facilities to come and repair that air conditioning. As a result of that, I had to refund multiple parties their rental fees because the building was so hot they could not host. They got there and couldn't host their event or hosted it and complained, and I had to return those rental fees. So we're starting to see... the results of deferred maintenance and years of not being able to upkeep that facility become part of the problem. And so while I'm grateful for the facility, we're starting to see those issues emerge. Okay. Remind me again, how old is that building? Is it like 30 years old or is it older? I believe it was dedicated in 1993, if I'm correct. Oh, so closer. Okay.

I guess in county buildings, I think that's one of the newer buildings probably we have. But I don't know, you know, if your predecessors, if there wasn't good communication. I mean, is it just a lot of deferred maintenance items that haven't been brought to the commission? I don't know. Yeah, I mean, I know you can only speak for the last eight months.

I'll speak to the last eight months. And I do think that we're rebuilding some of those relationships, and it feels like those are moving in a positive direction from what they were previously. So I'm hopeful. But at the same time, providing a short-term and long-term list doesn't always move the needle.

And one other question before I turn it over to Commissioner Howell. I know some other counties that went through branding issues because of what Commissioner Meitzner brought. Is this a K-State office or is this a Sedgwick County office? And I understand a lot of counties are taking that on and putting it right there on the building and letting them know that this county is taking ownership of this operation and that K-State is more the resource for your labs and everything that you don't have for all this testing.

I think that's why you see the Sedgwick County seal is the seal on the signage out front and displayed proudly and prominently throughout the building with some very small amounts of K-State branding on the building. Okay, okay. Commissioner Howell?

Thank you. Thank you, Chairman. Just a couple quick questions. So I want to just clarify, I know you have a county email, but who employs you?

I'm employed by K-State University. My paycheck and my benefits come through K-State University, but I would argue as well that the majority of the funding that funds my salary and the salaries of our agents and office professionals is held in the majority by Sedgwick County Funds.

How does that work?

So the operational funds we provide, it is somehow... You provide that appropriation in a quarterly allotment, and it is at our discretion to then use that as we will. I will tell you that our... current budget is about $1.1 million in revenue, and Sedgwick County supplies $705,000 of it. My salary line is projected to be about $852,000 a year, and I would tell you that every ounce of that $705,000 I spend goes towards salaries. Okay.

Are there any employees out there that are not being paid through Cedric County? Obviously, you just gave the numbers just a minute ago. So there's a number of employees that are paid through, I guess, the K-State revenue that is provided.

That is correct. I have one agent that is paid by KDADS, Kansas Department of Aging, through the SHIC program. And so he is paid, while he is a K-State Extension employee, and his benefits are provided by K-State Extension, The majority of his salary is paid through KDADS to support the SHIC program.

So if this revenue was to change, I'm just curious, what's the plan on how you would use the additional funds?

That is outlined in the documentation I provided you last night. It was titled... Request to Increase Fiscal Year 2027 Cedric County Allocation to K-State Extension. And it outlines four strategic investments that I would like, that I believe are needed, if we would receive that additional funding. And I think that, and these are in no particular order, but the first one listed is a Marketing, Social Media, and Events Coordinator type position. As I've said, our agents are hired to be educators, but they spend a lot of their time doing marketing of their own programs, coordinating events, and I think that is something that would greatly increase our visibility and public relations output should we secure a position like that. I'd like to see expanded school enrichment programming. The main area that we have cut due to funding cuts is our 4-H and school enrichment program. As Stephanie mentioned, we used to have three full-time agents, and we're down to one. So that greatly decreases our ability to be in schools and providing that curriculum, so an expanded school enrichment programming. Based on our facility agreement, as you can see, we are the holders of small equipment, things like tables, chairs, projectors. Those things are also 33 years old and are starting to affect our ability to generate rental revenue. And so I would like to improve some of our facility and technology improvements in our rental spaces, things like projectors, updated AV equipment to meet ADA standards, and finally, staff compensation. Over the three years of budget cuts, our staff have not seen any salary increases or cost of living increases, and the work that they do is highly valued and visible, and I'd like to reward them with a small cost of living increase to be able to continue the work that they do so that we can keep them in these roles and not have to retrain and have staff turnover. So those are my four investments I'd like to see happen.

So one of the previous conferees spoke about they fundraise for 4-H. Is that revenue retained by 4-H or is that going to the extension?

It is retained by 4-H in their accounts.

Do we have anything where you have any type of website, portal, place where people can donate to the extension office?

We do. I would ask you to take a look at our website again. We have a dedicated section on our website that says donate or funding or opportunities to give. I can't remember the exact title of it, but it's one of the nine squares that are listed on our website, and it offers a portal for giving. In that way, we also...

How much revenue did you get through that portal?

I don't have that number at this time.

When's the last time your room rental rates were adjusted?

I also don't know that. I believe about three years ago prior to my time, if I remember correctly.

Well, one of my frustrations is I don't know how much effort's been put into the idea of trying to solve this problem without public support. And I hear what you're saying. You want the 825. I get it. But... I guess to some of the previous comments by my colleagues here, pretty much all of the cultural rec took a haircut that one year. It was a 10% and it's still on there. And then there was a 5% after that. So it was a 10% cut, then a 5% cut. That's how you end up with that number. It's an odd number, $705,786. That's the total that's recommended in this recommended budget this year. Many are asking for 825,481. Why is 825,481 the right number? It's historic, but what makes that the right number?

We are not in this to get rich, and we are not in this to pad our budget or offer carryover. That $825,000 over those 10 years that we saw, that kept us at a pretty low. I'm going to use revenue neutral rate. That was right where we could be at. And we didn't see a large carryover from year to year that allowed us to do the programming that we needed to do and staff adequately. And so that felt like, would I love to see our budget be the same as Johnson County's at $1.07 million? Of course I would. But that $825 million is where we felt like it was being the best stewards of of the money afforded to us without a large carrier, we want to spend that money in programming and doing what we're supposed to do. And that felt like the right level for those 10 years and still feels like the right level today.

I guess I would ask, I know that there is some data we're getting right now regarding the activities and the financial health of the organization there. I don't know if it's available to us to see how much is in savings and how much is private versus public. I mean, other organizations don't really provide that data because they don't have to. So, again, for me to understand the need, I guess I would ask for more information. But, you know, this... I probably have some other comments. I'll probably reserve my comments going forward. But thank you for being here.

One of the things I just would like to quickly touch on is, as I mentioned in my comments about lumping us as part of community development and Exploration Place, the zoo, TCAM, as I've mentioned, all of those places costs money to get into, about $25 to get into the zoo, $21 for exploration place. And I also noted that TCAM charges $4 a head to go out into schools and do programming, plus a $25 programming fee. We don't do that. And I don't think Extension wants to do that. Do we have the amount of people coming into our property every single week? Yes, we do. 2,000 people come into our parking lot every single weekend to buy produce at the farmer's market. Would I like to stand at our entrance and charge $5 a car to get in, and would that make up that budget shortfall? You bet it would. But do I think that's in what this commission wants, what I think our tax rate? It's not. But... asking us to think of revenue solutions and fundraising like those other organizations doesn't feel right based on what I think our mission is. And so I just wanted to bring that forth that I think we're different in that way and that's why we're asking for the level of support that we are. Thank you.

Okay, so Kelly, I want to understand. You said you guys have not given any raises or colas or anything in three years. Is that correct?

That is correct. The only thing that we have done is offered very small one-time merit-based bonuses as needed, especially for staff. Like in the absence of a director for six months last year, we had two staff that took on interim director roles, and they were offered a small stipend for that bonus. extra work that they did in the interim director role.

Tom, what other organizations do we have that haven't received any kind of financial compensation in the last three years?

I don't know. When the county designate dollars for any outside entity, that money goes to them if we don't get into their business process. Okay.

Does anyone have any other questions? Brian, I'm sorry. No, it's fine. Kelly, thank you. Appreciate it. Thank you. Wealth and knowledge as usual. Appreciate all the work you do. I guess my question really is kind of maybe for Lindsay or Lorraine or Tom. We go through a pretty extensive budget process starting in February, and we have decision packages that come from every department. I don't think we submitted a decision package. These are conversations worthy of more discussion and trying to understand. These are conversations worthy of legislative platform to try to understand if we can get the state to help in some of these things. This is not a critique. You're contending for your department. So I don't feel like it's just thrown on us late. My point in all of this is I just think that these are conversations that are a lot more dynamic than just, I mean, we give $705,000 a year. We used to give $800,000 a year. We provide $107,000 in in-kind building and support. What's the right number? I just think that this is a really complex conversation that I would love to spend a lot of time on. But I bet I got about two hours. So that's kind of a challenge here.

So, Commissioner, Lindsay Pogerstar, your CFO, I would say, yes, this is absolutely where they have a conversation. I think it is, you know, it was an intentional reduction. to those culture and recreation and community development programs where we had the option. Obviously, we've talked about WSU where you have a designated 1.5 mills and it kind of is what it is. But there was that intention to reduce the property tax rate. I do think that from an equity standpoint, it would make really good sense if we're going to talk about restoring funding to be able to have that conversation, bring everybody back. If there's something that commission wants to see, I've heard about return on investment and some of those measures. We can start maybe incorporating those in funding agreements or things like that, and then come back and have that conversation anytime. I know right now we're talking about a 2027 budget, but obviously for the retreat next year or at any point between now and then, we can have those conversations about how you want to evaluate that funding going forward. I also know the commission has talked about trying to find alternative revenue streams for some of these things. And so that could also be a part of this conversation. So I think there's a lot of moving parts. But yes, your point is well taken. We did have that process. We do know we have $7.5 million of other asks that were not funded. So I do want to make sure that just when we look at it from that equity perspective, we're thinking through that as well.

Lindsey, while you're up there real quick, so you and I have had some conversations. You've been helping me. I've been trying to do a little bit of an analysis between what we invest in WSU and what we invest in the extension and looking to return on investment, specifically for Sedgwick County. I know you put out some large numbers for me. It looks like the state is... the bigger benefactor with WSU and maybe the county is a little bit more at the extension. Could we kind of touch on some of that? I know you did it last night. I appreciate it. Sorry, hitting you up to the last minute, but just trying to get a good understanding. Sure.

So I mean, and I will say for the purpose of the commission, the same thing I said to you last night, and that is I have not had an opportunity to verify with WSU. So what I'm going to give you is the best information I could find. So just bear with me from that front, please. But you're right. So you had asked kind of how that funding is appropriated. And so then I was able to find some information that ties back. So the budget that was provided to commissioners by Wichita State University for the 1.5 mills only that is governed completely by their WSU Board of Trustees is $4.3 million for capital improvements, $5.6 million for student support, $640,000 for economic and community development, and about $1.6 million for board support services. Then there's about $1.5 million worth of budget authority that is reserved in contingency. And that is really in case we collect more than we think we will, we have a budget authority established to make the payment to WSU. Otherwise, we can't do that. So I think the largest individual items were about $4.36 million for Sedgwick County merit scholarships. And when we come and we look at what that ROI is that was reported back, so for workforce and students, you're right. They look at the graduates. Seventy-four percent of those graduates stay in the state of Kansas. It doesn't necessarily that they stay within the city of Wichita. There were 12,328 student career and applied learning experiences and about 39.2 million in student earnings. And there was participation in that from 813 employers. Then we also looked at what the capital improvements and debt was, because as you know, that is the single biggest hindrance in getting rid of the 1.5 mils or reducing it, is the fact that Sedgwick County government has committed, has sold that service on behalf of the university. And so there was some information that was provided back in terms of the athletics and visitor impact. So that would tie back to their Cessna Stadium, I think. Now, again, this is regional dollars, not necessarily Sedgwick County dollars, but they said approximately $59.9 million of annual regional economic impact associated with WSU athletics, about $19.7 million in visitor spending, and about... 655,000 visits to Charles Koch Arena in 24, with 26% coming from at least 50 miles away. So again, outside of the area. And then at the broader institutional level, is that kind of what you're getting at with this? Okay. At the broader institutional level, WSU has been estimated to contribute approximately $1.3 billion annually to the Kansas economy and support 5,000 jobs statewide. So again, they're putting that in the context of the whole state. I don't have that information specifically for Sedgwick County. And so I think it is somewhat hard to compare those two groups. Obviously, it's important to note that Extension, I think, generally focuses more on the 4-H, so a K-12 cohort, whereas obviously the university focuses on an older population. So I'm happy to get into it. There are some other details in here about NCAT, WSU Tech. I don't know if you want me to talk to those, too.

No, just kind of trying to compare it to some of the things that I've discussed with you with the potential motion that I'm looking at later. You know, our $825,000 allocation, we're asking to increase that too. They do 39,800 volunteer hours at a value of $1.3 million, helping 22 volunteers. 100 local seniors at a value of $2 million. There's significant value here in this. I feel like I've collectively heard from commissioners that, hey, this is rush. This is last minute. We haven't heard all the details. However, there's a parking garage that we just publicly discussed. A couple weeks ago, I brought that up to you. You know, it's $20 million plus ask that we've got coming. We haven't had any public meetings on it. It's not in our budget. So sometimes, you know, we're going to have to do the best job that we can to make the correct decision for Sedgwick County.

Sure.

Okay. Commissioners, do you have any other questions? Okay. I'm going to ask one more time. Would anyone else like to speak on the public agenda? Because I'm ready to close the public hearing.

I think there was a motion and a second. Chairman, I believe it was a motion and a second to receive and file. Madam Clerk. Okay. Thank you.

I'm not ready to make it again. Okay. So, Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howe.

Aye.

Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Blumenthal.

Aye. And the motion passes 5-0. Before we go on to the next item, I'm going to ask that we take a 30-minute break. Actually, a 35-minute break. I want to start at 1245 sharp. Does that work for everybody? Okay. We'll see you then. Okay, we're going to go ahead and call the meeting back to order. Madam Clerk, next item.

Item J, adoption of the 2027 Cedric County budget and the capital improvement program.

Good afternoon, Chairman and Commission. Tom Stolz, County Manager, and this is the moment we've all been waiting for. So we start this process back in February with a retreat with commissioners to gather ideas, put presentations on. Staff goes through budget hearings in April to where all the departments and divisions come in and present their budget requests. We then go in front of you and open public meetings. All the staff appears in front of you making budget requests with analysis. And then we go through, then the recommended budget came to you on July 15th, and in between July 15th and now, a lot of discussion, a lot of public discussion, a lot of talking with constituents on what we could do to make final additions to this budget. I want to stop right now, otherwise I won't get an opportunity to do it, and thank some people. So I want to thank that finance team back there and these two finance people right here, Lindsay and Lorian. and the leadership team that forms the budget team. It's called a manager's budget, but in reality, it's all of us working together. I want to thank this commission. I've worked in government for over 40 years, and this commission and their focus and dial-in on this budget is very unusual. And I just want to thank you because I know it's a lot of your time. We drag you through these hearings. A lot of governments don't do that with their elected officials. We do. You spend outside time, you do outside research, and it's such a pleasure to work for elected officials that dial into that much in budget. It's unusual. And then I want to thank the staff of the county. So we go through this budget process. You've already touched on it a couple times this morning. Not everybody gets everything they want. In fact, nobody ever gets everything they want. And somebody already mentioned we left 7.5 million of decision packages on the table. Many of that, many of those asks are core service, public safety service. We left it on the table because we're trying to balance a big picture. So this staff that we have, though they're not happy, they are professional, they keep their head down, they keep grinding, and they appreciate what the commission does for them and the support they give. So I just want to tell you what a great staff that Sedgwick County has and how professional that they are and how they act. Okay, now let me get back on script. So Sedgwick County has now held two public hearings regarding this budget. One was on July 29th and the other was an hour or so ago on today. Regarding the 2027 recommended Sedgwick County operating budget of $624,195,119. The proposed budget includes a $217,672,598 property tax levy, which is approximately equivalent to a property tax rate expressed in mills of $26.842. Sedgwick County's five-year capital improvement plan includes the building, remodeling, and repairing of public facilities and infrastructure. Funding the 2027 capital budget of $71,228,014 includes $47,152,425 for facilities and drainage projects and $24,075,589 for road and bridge projects. The CIP also includes a rigorous inspection and maintenance program of county infrastructure that protects investments in existing roads, bridges, and drainage structures. So, like all budgets, there's good news and bad news, and without going through everything I went through at recommended budget, I'll summarize high level. The good news of this budget is we have a large commit to EMS, and there's some members here. We also understand this is a phased approach with EMS, but this year it's quite a commit that the commission is making with this recommended budget. We try to give reasonable and competitive compensation, and I emphasize the word reasonable. We try to stay up with market. We try to allocate in this budget a reasonable investment of infrastructure, including building roads and bridges. We make A commitment to a few strategic positions within the county for staffing, and including our appraiser's office, which we talked some about yesterday and we'll talk more about today. And then the two staples, it's a balanced budget that's being presented to you, recommended, and it captures only a portion of the valuation growth, and we're going to lower the mill levy again, if you vote for this. Now, there are four what I would call technical modifications within this budget that don't impact the dollars, but they impact allocations. And these are motions, I believe they have them, right, Lindsay? They're on your desk. You have to make the motion. I cannot. I can simply just talk about them and suggest them. There are four. One is, number one is to eliminate the CIP project to replace two floating docks at Sedgwick County Park. And the corresponding grant managed transfer of $22,132 in the Parks Department. We did not get that grant, so now we can remove that portion of money from the budget. Number two, the Public Works Director has talked with you about this too, is he'd like to move the funding from R328, which is a Northwest Expressway right-of-way acquisition, to three capital improvement projects that need additional funding. And if we want to go into detail on that, Mr. Packers here can go into detail on that. Number 3 is Project 382. The 63rd Street South Pathway will be receiving an additional $172,544 from Butler County. And this motion will allow for budget to be increased by this amount to allow for the county to receive that contribution and then expend that amount for that project. And number four is a reallocation regarding the vehicles of EMS that were in the recommended budget. When we came forward with the recommended budget, we were, I think it was two ambulances and two command vehicles. And we have had discussion with EMS command and what they'd like to ask for. And again, the dollars are the same. It's just the kinds of vehicles they're wanting to acquire. Is they want three... ambulances, the E350 ambulances, which are a smaller ambulance, and three operational support vehicles. So we're changing the kinds of vehicles that EMS is asking for. So with that Is that it, Lindsay? I'd ask that you, I know there's discussion that has to happen. I know you've each got some motions you'd like to make, but after that discussion is done, we'd ask that you adopt a resolution for the 2027 Sedgwick County operating budget as amended and the capital improvement program and authorize the chairman to sign when we get to that point. Chairman, yours.

All right. Commissioners, do you guys have any questions? If not, I think the way I'd like to go about this is I would like to start going through some of the staff motions first. And as you guys see in front of you, we have some motions one, two, three, and four. Do you guys have those? Yeah. Okay. I'm thinking about skipping number two for right now because there might be another motion related to that. So I think I'll just start out with motion number one. Lindsay, go ahead.

Sure. So, commissioners, again, for the record, Lindsay Purviso, CFO. So the process for today that we would recommend that you follow is that each commissioner basically volunteers to present a motion. When you present that motion, it is our recommendation that you vote on that motion at that time. Lorian will... All of the motions, we already have prepared language that we'll type in based on the motions that we are aware of. As you make those motions, Laurie, and we'll track that in, and you'll be able to see in the BOCC deliberation column of this file what the bottom line impact is to your financial forecast for each of those. So again, our recommendation is that you, each commissioner, makes that motion. you vote up and down, and then we move to the next one. Once you have concluded all discussion of motions, we will give you an appropriate budget adoption motion. Right now, there's many things that come into play. I think we've got six or seven variations of the budget adoption motion, so we're just going to hang on to those and then figure out what the right one is to give you when we get closer to the conclusion of the discussion.

Okay, so to clarify, you'd You'd rather me just wait on the staff motions until after the commission? Either way.

Either way. We can go ahead and move through those now, but for number two, and then go into individual commissioner motions, or you can take those at the end. That is completely up to the commission if you're just dying to talk about your own or if you want to just move through those procedural ones first.

Commissioner Howell? Thank you, Chairman, just because I have a number of motions, but in years past, my motions haven't passed very much. I would like to have the opportunity to make some of these staff motions, assuming that they might have a better chance of passing. If you give me the chance to speak, I will probably make a couple of these motions that staff has recommended.

Deal. You got it, sir.

It would be a highlight of my life.

Thank you for the sense of humor, Commissioner. We need that.

You've got until 1.15. Oh, my gosh. Go ahead, Commissioner.

Fast, but you've got to be surprised how fast I can talk. Actually, Mr. Chairman, I'll just say on my yellow sheets, which are some of the motions that staff prepared, one of them is exactly identical. Let's just start with the easiest one, I think. We did not get a grant for these docks out at Sedgwick County Park. And simply just to take this off the list, is very easy. It's the fourth one of your list on the white sheets. And it says, I move that Sedgwick County would eliminate the facilities project to replace two floating docks at Sedgwick County Park because we learned that our recent grant funding application has been rejected. Further, I move that we reallocate the funding for the grant match from the Parks Department budget to the operating reserve in the amount of $22,132. So I think that's a great motion, and I would like to make that motion, and we'll see what happens. Okay, we have a motion.

Do we have a second? Yes. Okay, we have a motion in a second. Commissioners, would you like to discuss? Any questions? Okay. If not, Madam Clerk, call the roll, please.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howe.

Aye.

Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Blubaugh.

Aye. And that motion passes 5-0.

Congratulations, Commissioner Howe.

One for one. Is that it? We got another one? I'm surprised. Anyway, there's actually two more really, I think, fairly easy ones here. Thanks for AMS staff for being here, and I think this is a great motion. I wasn't aware of this idea being a good idea, but it was presented in staff yesterday, I think, or Friday. I'm not sure which day it was, but I think it's actually a really good idea. This is to swap out what we were going to purchase. with some more nimble ambulances, which I think are going to provide a lot of opportunity, rather than having a giant 550 or whatever it is that makes a non-emergency transport. These actually would be very fitted for specific things we do in EMS. And so I would move that we reallocate the additions to the EMS fleet from two ambulances, big ambulances, and two operational support vehicles. Instead of that, we would do the addition of three E350 ambulances and three operational support vehicles. It's revenue neutral, but it's simply changing how we spend the money. So that's my motion.

Second.

We have a motion and we have a second. Commissioners, do you have questions? Yeah, just a quick comment.

I appreciate what we're doing here with EMS this year. This is a big part of this budget. It was last budget. We spent a lot of time on 911. These are scaling over time. I want to make a public comment for all the people that live in Valley Center and Park City and all my constituents that live in District 4 and to staff at EMS. We are not done. We're going to scale this over time. We know there's a big need. I understand the status zero, status one events. We are committed, this commission has signaled, we are committed to scaling EMS services, looking at how we do that, how we modernize the approach, deployment models, all of these things. We are committed to doing this. We know the need. We're trying to balance what our taxpayers can afford right now. So I appreciate all the work, the great work that's done by all of our EMS personnel. And they have a hard job, man. They've got a hard job. The Sedgwick County EMS has always been a spectacular organization, nationally renowned. And under your leadership, I think it's returned to exactly that. So I'm grateful for the commitment and I'm grateful that this commission's gonna do some things in this budget likely in this budget to continue us on a path, but that path won't finish after this budget. We're going to keep scaling and keep doing what we have to do, so I'll happily vote for this motion.

Okay. Commissioner Meister? Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I just want to thank you. I know when this came to us, Commissioner Howe kind of referenced it, but thank you for getting yourselves together and rethinking and redoing what you think is best within this budget. I couldn't tell you the difference between the vehicles, but I trust you're readjusting and doing that. What Commissioner Beatty just said, your service, appreciate it very much. Thank you.

Commissioner Howell? Again, did I already make the motion? I think I did. Yeah, we've got a motion and a second. Yeah, I think that's a motion. I think I should call the question.

Okay.

All right. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty.

Aye.

Commissioner Howe.

Aye.

Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Blumenthal.

Aye. Motion passes five to zero. Thank you, Chairman, by the way. I love having this chance to pass a little something. This is kind of fun. I get used to this. Anyway, I won't get used to it. Motion number three on this white sheet that came from the staff. This is... We talked about this the other day, and again, it was either Tuesday or Friday. I forget the date. But this is, if you're not aware, there's a really amazing sidewalk that goes basically from Goddard all the way to the county line, almost. It stops basically about 100 and... a little bit past Greenwich Road, it stops going east in Derby. What this would be is Butler County is helping us. There's grant money involved, and Butler County is involved, and we have a nice coordination with Butler County to use the money that we have. It's not going to take money out of our sales tax funds. This is somebody taking money from Grant and from Butler County to finish the sidewalk so it goes clear to the county line. In fact, I think they're taking it clear to Rose Hill Road, if I understand correctly. So essentially, this is a really easy thing to do. It doesn't cost us anything out of our budget specifically. So I make a motion that we would increase the budget authority for B382, 63rd Street South Pathway by $172,544 to allow for the city-county contribution from Butler County to be received by the county and then expended. That's the motion.

Do we have a motion? Do we have a second?

Second.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Commissioner, do you have any questions you would like to clarify? Okay. Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howe. Aye. Commissioner Weiss. Aye. Chairman Bluwa.

Aye. Motion passes 5-0. Do you have another one? That's all the easy ones. I have some that we can talk about. We'll see what happens. If you want, Mr. Chairman, I'd be glad to start the discussion on some of the more complicated, difficult ideas, at least. I'm not sure these will pass, but let's at least talk about them. The next one I'd like to talk about is the Arts Council. Okay. And I would just say that the Arts Council, I wrote this up because I wanted to explain. The Arts Council does not appear to have unique government, does not have a unique governmental ownership, operational, or statutory relationship with Sedgwick County, comparable to other organizations receiving county cultural funding. It is an independent nonprofit organization. that receives a direct county appropriation through the community programs budget. So my question is, why is Sedgwick County funding this particular independent nonprofit and what county-specific public purpose distinguishes it from other arts organizations that receive no county funding? The county has already demonstrated historically that funding to the Arts Council is a discretionary policy. CHOICE RATHER THAN AN ESSENTIAL COUNTY GOVERNMENT FUNCTION. IF YOU'RE NOT AWARE, BACK IN 2015 AND 2016, WE PROVIDED ZERO DOLLARS TO THEM. THEY WERE RECEIVING AROUND $14,000 AT THE TIME. WE WENT TO ZERO. 17 or maybe it was 2018, we restored them back to $15,000. It actually had an increase, if you will. The Arts Council has no county in its name and no county-owned facility and no obvious county operating responsibility. My question is, what specifically does Sedgwick County's appropriation, this time it's $9,256, What does that contribution purchase or accomplish for Sedgwick County residents that would otherwise not occur? In other words, is there but four? The county deliberately eliminated the Arts Council allocation in the 2016 budget. Actually, it was 2016 and 2017 that was the two years. And then we restored that back in 2018. By the way, when this was trimmed out of the budget, there was other community programs such as the Kansas Junior Livestock Association, Greater Wichita Area Sports Commission, and CanSell, just to name a few, among others. And so this one, for some reason, appears to be a lot more political. I don't know what else we can trim in our budget. I know this is not substantive in terms of no one's going to notice it in the property tax bill because it's a fairly small amount of dollars. But to me, it's a principal issue. And if we can't handle the $9,256 trim in our budget, then I guess we have... I guess I would be surprised. I don't think this organization is going to do badly because of this. I know they have a return on the investment or ROI calculation, which is astronomical. And I guess I would just challenge them to go, just like I did with the extension office, go fundraise $9,200. I think it's not so hard for them to do that. Again, when they went to zero those two years, they had historic level funding from the community. They far exceeded the money they would have gotten from the county because the following two years they were able to receive funds through donations that they would have never received had we not given them that haircut. So I would argue that they don't actually need the money. By the way, we're actually giving more than Wichita has given them. I have the exact number if you want to know what they're giving them. I guess the Wichita Arts Council, did I have that right? And the Arts Council... I actually don't have it in front of me. I thought I did. But I believe it's less than what we're giving them right now. So a few years ago, they were substantially less than the county, giving them around $7,000 or so. By the way, Wichita does levy a one-mill mill levy. And for them, that's over $5 million. They're receiving property taxes to support the arts. And again, as a Wichita Arts Council, I think if they want to receive $9,000 more, currently, again, they're not funding them through the mill levy, even to the magnitude that we are. I think that ought to be questioned. So I would like to make a motion, Mr. Chairman, that we would eliminate the Arts Council funding. I move that we eliminate the $9,256 of funding allocated to the Arts Council in 2027 and reallocate it to the Operating Reserve. That's my motion.

Okay, we have a motion. Commissioner Beatty? I appreciate Commissioner Howell, this conversation. I would just acknowledge a couple things before we take this vote. It is a nominal dollar amount. I'm actually the representative on the county, was appointed as a representative on the county to sit on the Arts Council Board. And for the public, many times when we appoint a commissioner on a board where there is funding, our job is oversight for the most part. That's why we're on the board, to make sure that the county funds and the county taxpayers being stewarded appropriately. And that's my job, and they do a good job. The Arts Council does a fantastic job in regards to what they're advocating for and the things that they do. I would just ask the Commission to acknowledge it's a very nominal amount, and we are getting ready to move, in my perception, into a season where we are going to be having a broader conversation about cultural arts funding. We've been talking a little bit about it today, obviously, with Extension Center. This conversation is going to come up with Exploration Place, the zoo. We're going to try to bring the city of Wichita into this conversation with transient guest tax, visit Wichita. We're going to try to bring them into the conversation with the funding for Art Museum and Botanica and Cowtown and the like, because we're going to try to get some strategy and synergize our efforts in these things. In order to get momentum to get something across the finish line, I think we're going to need the city of Wichita, and I might say we're going to need the Arts Council. We're going to need their support and their advocacy to try to move a broader conversation forward as to how we do this. We're going to need a collaborative effort. So I appreciate Commissioner Househart. It is a principled position for him, and he's raised this issue. I think every year I've been on the commission, he's raised this issue. I would just say that my vote to not do this is based on what we're trying to accomplish in a broader conversation. It is a nominal amount of dollars. I do understand that. And they do have grant funding that comes from the city, which ought to pay for some of those art grants. They do have financing for those things. And they do have city staff that's staffing the Arts Council and helping in that regard. It is a good board. So my position would be no, not as because the county has a direct role in the Arts Council, in as much as the county has a direct role in the broader conversation the Arts Council is going to be a part of. And I think that's... that might be worth a $9,200 investment to make sure that we can help guide that ship and have a partner in that with the Arts Council for the broader conversation that we're going. So I respect my commissioner, my colleagues, and their opinions on this, but I do think we're going to need the Arts Council in this broader conversation.

Okay. We have a motion. We do not have a second yet, correct? Correct. Okay. Anyone like to second the motion or make additional comment?

Well, I'll go ahead. You know, I think that we're late. I don't know that they've given a heads up that this might be on the table. Being far into probably their planning for next year fiscally, I guess I would take a different route here. So I'm going to propose an alternate motion, if that's okay. Can I go ahead and read? Okay.

It might be, Commissioner Wise, Justin Wagner, County Councilor, it might be best if you were considering making a motion to have the chairman inquire if there is a second, and if there's a lack of a second, then to go ahead and make, because you can't really make a substitute motion. I think traditionally we want the motion to have been seconded. So if that's your intent, it might be to have the chairman inquire. If there's not a second, then you can make your motion. Am I anticipating your question right there, Commissioner Wise?

Sure. I think we're almost there, I guess.

But you're not seconding the motion?

I'm not going to second it.

So I'm just trying to stay broken.

Yeah. So then you would be making a new motion. A new motion. And commissioner-wise, you can make any comments that you want to. I was just talking through that.

If we're ready for an alternative or if you'd like me to just go further into my thoughts, I don't mind doing that either.

It's not, you know, it's just trying to keep our points. It's not a substitute. The first motion has died for lack of a second. Okay. So now, go ahead.

Okay. So I'd like to make a motion. I move that we authorize the funding included for the Arts Council of $9,256 in the 2027 budget, but that we direct staff to work with the Arts Council to create a funding agreement that includes performance measures and objectives with a report due to the Commission by June 1st of 2027. The intent would be to discontinue funding if performance objectives are not met. That is my motion.

Do we have a second?

We have a motion without a second.

No, so it's dead.

You know, I'll second that motion. I think that's a viable motion. I think that anybody we're giving dollars to, that we can sit down and have a conversation about a funding agreement and what that looks like. I think the Arts Council would be receptive of that, frankly. Their leadership is very receptive about performance standards and the outputs. And I think we should define that we want to have a broader conversation, that this is not just about what's happening in the arts community. We want to have a broader conversation about cultural arts in general, and we want their support in doing it. And so I'll second that motion. Okay. Do we have a motion and a second?

Discussion? Thank you, Chairman. Just a question. They receive funding currently. Don't they have reporting requirements today? No. Why would they not have reporting requirements right now?

We have not historically required that.

I thought everybody that received grant funds from Sedgwick County had to report back.

No. That is something that we've discussed over the years as something that we may want to include in future funding agreements, but we have not yet established a policy that says that is a requirement of receiving county funds. I think it would be a great thing to add, a great policy to create, but we don't yet have it.

I guess I'll put that on my things to do list. That needs to happen, so I'll be asking for that in a future staff meeting for us to discuss that moving forward.

Thank you. We have a motion and a second. Any other discussion? If not, Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howe. No. Commissioner Wise. Aye. Chairman Buva.

Aye. And the motion passes 4-1. At this time, I would like to make one of my motions. We've had a lot of conversation about restoring Extension Council funding, and I would like to make a motion that we move that we transfer $119,695 from operating reserve to the Extension Council budget. increasing its 2027 allocation to $825,481, consistent with the historic funding level. I make this motion based on the following information provided by the Extension Director. First, Extension is able to leverage more than 39,800 volunteer hours annually, valued at more than $1.34 million, and equivalent to approximately 14.2 full-time positions. Second, a grant-funded Extension position coordinates 25 SHIC volunteers who helped almost 2,200 local seniors save almost $2 million in Medicare costs. And finally, Extension reports serving more than 100,000 residents and providing programming in a county agricultural sector with approximately $175 million in annual market outputs. That is my motion. Is there a second? Is there a second? I'll second that. Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any discussion?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So the process, 119,000 would come out of the operating reserve. Yes, sir. So the impact is that on the next budget, we got to figure out where to replace that?

If the intention is to keep that as recurring funding, yes, that would be the next step.

Well, based on everything I've learned in the last 24 hours, I think this is a prime candidate for a great conversation in a workshop as we work into the next budget. Or if we find there's an emergency, then we can try to talk about it at that time. So respectfully, I love what they're doing. I totally respect it. But there's too many unanswered questions right now for me. So I'll be voting no on that.

I just want to verify again, if it was passed today, it's not an automatic that that recurs again next year, is that correct? Correct. Okay. Commissioner Weiss?

I'll follow up with what Commissioner Meitzner was saying. I really appreciate the Extension Office, and I think I've made that pretty clear just as a new commissioner coming in. But I can't support restoring this funding request today. And the reason is we've kind of talked about it. We have 45-plus departments that come with decision packages, and this wasn't one of them. I respect that process. I feel like it gives us time to ask a lot more questions. And if anything is clear today, it's this, that we have a lot that we don't understand about what extension does, how the budget is ran. Not that we have doubts or concerns, but we need to understand it to... to commit to these increase of dollars. I think we also have learned that there's maybe some commitments per the contract that neither party is upholding right now. So I would encourage the quarterly reporting to be done so we can understand, Kelly, what you guys are doing and learn more so that we can support you better. And then I would like to work with facilities on making sure that we're upholding our part of our contract agreement by... maintaining this asset. So that's where I'm at today. It's out of no despair of what you guys do. Kelly, you do a great job. I'm so excited for you. And I know that you were hired at the beginning of the budget process. So you're probably just now getting your feet underneath you, and that's why we're talking today. But I do feel that it's unfair for us to make this consideration while we have so many others that went through the process that we had to say no to. and a lot of other needs that are competing with us today. So those are my thoughts, why I can't support that motion, but please know that I want to continue the conversation and I want to, both sides have pulled our contract a little bit better and I think we should staff this. I think we need to talk about where you live in our budget, what section you're in, and we have a lot to do, but we need to put that on the calendar and talk about it more.

Commissioner Howell, did you turn? I do. Thank you. I want to explain, first of all, why did I second the motion? I probably will be voting no, but I think to have a recorded vote for something we spent so much time on is probably valuable to give us a chance to vote yes or no. I don't know if it's going to pass or not. I don't know, but I would agree with the previous two speakers. I have concerns as well. Let me ask a question to Lindsay. If we don't do this today, as we decide six months from now, we need to give them some additional support. Is that an option?

As long as you have contingency budget, it is always an option for a commission to make a decision on future spending.

So this doesn't have to be done now. We can work on some things, but we can make a decision when it's appropriate time for us to say, we understand what we're doing, we've exhausted every other option, and we have things in place like reporting or... Let me just throw out there, I'm not suggesting you charge people $5 to drive into the facility, but could you not at least put up and say donations are welcome because that's how this, you know, if you simply encourage people. I do a breakfast every month for men. I don't charge them $5, but I recommend if you want to help pay for this breakfast, I cook. And I say I recommend, you know, around $5. Some people throw in $100. Some people throw in $20. Some people don't pay anything. It's totally fine. But at least they know that that's how it's paid for. And I just think there is an option that says... Having a little link on the website is something. I appreciate that being on there. I didn't see that before, and I did see it today. I just think we can work on trying to find a way to solve this without public support. I do think more reporting is necessary. I do think charging schools something... is reasonable. If they're charging the schools something at the zoo and they're going to the extension office, they have an activity that costs money, they should at least recoup the costs. Something. There are 20 school districts that come into Central County. That's a lot of children, potentially. A lot of tours. You talk about 2,000 people every weekend come in. I think if you let the world know that there is an expectation that this is partially supported by the community itself and donations are welcome, maybe adjust your room rates a little. In other words, work to solve the problem, and then at some point we can have a decision maybe to fund this additionally. But I don't think we're there today. So I don't mind voting no on this, but I do think we have work to do. I think you do.

Before I go to Commissioner Beatty, I want to make sure I understand Lindsey correctly. We could staff this next month, and if the commission kind of got a head nod that, hey, we want to fund this, we could just bring this back to the line item and... Am I correct?

So if you wanted to do it for 2026, yes. If you wanted to do it for 2027, we would probably encourage you to wait until January 1st so that you're voting to make changes in the actual fiscal year that we have a budget. But certainly we can figure that out and make plans for it if you want to staff it sooner and then say come back to us the first week of January with some kind of consent agenda item to make that happen. We can certainly do that.

Okay, thanks. Commissioner Beatty. Lindsay, thank you. Just a few comments. One, I want to thank you. One of the things that happens whether in any elected position is you represent your district and you bring your life and your experiences to the bench and it helps you to make decisions on the things that you know from your life. I've known you for a little while. I know how 4-H and I know how much you feel about the power in these programming. So I want to give you credit for advocating for something that you know so deeply about. And so thank you for that. Kelly, you did yourself a service today in regards to the way you contended for Extension Center and your people and all the speakers. I want to thank you for that. What will come of this is a broader conversation. about our partnership. And I think what will come of it also is we're going to go to the state. We're going to have a conversation about the state's partnership and how they can best support and to better understand all that's happening in Extension Center and how we can support all of these things that are happening in a better way. We're giving roughly $700,000 plus now, plus some in-kind stuff. I don't know. A few years ago, I think we totaled that up, $150,000 or what it might be for in-kind, but... I think the annual budget for the facilities is a little north of $200,000. Okay, so $700,000 cash, a couple hundred thousand dollars in kind, and I'm totally aware that you're working as lean as you can. I'm acknowledging that. This is a conversation, to everyone else's point, that I want to dig deeper in. I want to staff, I want to have a good conversation on what this looks like. There are a lot of competing interests. And Commissioner Wise made a point that we have a process with decision packages that starts in February and March and April, and you were just getting onboarded at that point in time. So I think that you'll enjoy that process to come and make your case in front of the commission during that as well. But we may not even have to wait that long in regards to just sitting down and talking about extension and understanding it. We have significant needs in this county right now. It's been alluded a couple times through that decision package process. There were $7.5 million worth of department requests that we had to say no to. And it's not because they're not worthy requests. Every one of them were worthy with directors that care deeply about it. It's just an issue of what our taxpayers can afford at this point in time. So I may know, but it's not because I don't think the value of the work. And we've talked and emailed, and I'm committed to coming back to this and having a deeper conversation what the partnership looks like and what we can do. So I'm a big fan. I'm grateful for the work you guys do and grateful for your advocacy for them. And we'll see what we can do in the partnership and how we can best deploy the resources and the access to resources that we have for you guys.

But before I call the roll here, you can kind of read the writing on the wall. I don't look like this is going to pass, but I appreciate the commissioners, a majority of our speakers, hearing what they're doing, the advocacy. Kelly, you're doing, Stephanie, what you're doing, and all your volunteers. and all the kids and you guys are changing lives out there and I think this is conversation gives us a great platform to learn more and to help advocate with the state just just like my colleagues have said I think it's time to shine a light on what's working and I've I've spent most of my lifetime involved with 4-H and FFA and extensions, and I understand it, and I'm going to take the opportunity to advocate more for it. So I appreciate everybody keeping an open mind and listening everything out. And Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner? No. Commissioner Beatty? No. Commissioner Howell? No. Commissioner Weiss? No. Chairman Blumhoff?

Aye. And it fails four to one. So next time, or next one up, I'd like to make another motion here. So, and this is in regard to the fair funding that we've discussed, and I move that we transfer $5,000 from the operating reserve to the Sedgwick County Fair line of the cultural and recreational community program budget and direct the additional funding in the fairs 4-H program. I make this motion because the additional $5,000 would cover nearly all of the specific gap between fair expenses and their fair board's baseline contribution without replacing the contribution and because this year's fair included 470 youth exhibitors and nearly $2,500 exhibits providing a measurable base for the additional 4-H support. That is my motion. And I just want to say on top of my motion, we just had a discussion about the Arts Council. And I think some of the issues were there wasn't any Sedgwick County name on it, and who was affected. This is our kids. The parents who ever went out and fundraised just for ribbons, dollar and a quarter premiums, and it's a pretty nominal amount, and I would hope that this board could go ahead and get behind this. Do I have a motion?

A question before we ask for a second. Lindsay, the motion is to call from the operating reserve. I just got a question. We have a county commissioner budget. Could we allocate the dollars? Could we adjust the motion, allocate the dollars, one-time funding from this until we have a broader conversation of what this could look like and do it from the county commission budget? We have a contingency for county commissioners that goes unused for the most part every year. It's $5,000.

In lieu of doing the operating reserve, yes, you could use the BOCC contingency.

As a statement from the commission that we want to better support I would make a substitute motion to incorporate what?

You don't have a second. You got to let it fail first.

Oh, we got to let the thing fail. Okay. So my motion dies for lack of a second. Would you like to? I'd like to make a motion to incorporate the funding for the Cedric. Thank you. I move that we transfer $5,000 from the Sedgwick County Commission contingency budget and direct the additional funding to the fairs 4-H program. I make this motion because the additional $5,000 will cover nearly all the reported gap between fair expenses and fair board's baseline contribution. without replacing that contribution because this year's fair included 470 youth exhibitors and nearly 2,500 exhibits, providing a measurable base for additional 4-H support. That's my motion. And I'll second that motion.

We have a motion and a second. Commissioner Meister?

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Your question was exactly what I was going to ask as well, even with the comment that although it's a little bit north of requests that we get from the commission budget based on chamber events, $1,000 sponsorship for table and whatever else during the course of a year. So my mind was saying this is... A little bit more than what we've been spending on some sponsorships, but it's more comfortable to fall into the commission decision side of the budget for me. So I am supportive of this motion, but please comment. Thank you.

So we won't actually, I want to be very clear that the way this motion is structured, we will take the budget authority from your BOCC contingency, not from your operating budget. Correct. And we will then move it to culture and rec community programs. It will not be paid from the BOCC operating budget. That's a separate budget. So I just want to be clear that that would be the technicalities of how this would work so that we can continue to track that expense over time in a fair fashion. Yep, that's good.

Okay, before I go to Commissioner Howell-Lindsay, I want to ask, okay, so how would 4-H come up next year if, you know, they're obviously had less than half the money it took to operate the fair because of judges and, you know, I mean, pretty minimal expense for what you guys do out there. Where is their opportunity next year so that we don't get into this again? I mean, does 4-H have a seat at the table? How does that work?

So let's take a quick step back. And so 4-H, the 4-H fair is not a specific allocation from Sedgwick County government. The way it works is we give funding to the Sedgwick County Fair, and then that fair board, as I understand it, makes the decisions about how those funds are allocated. So I would recommend that that group approach the fair board. Now, in this case, you're making that money conditional on something. Going forward, it would probably behoove them to talk to the fair and make sure that that's going to be the expectation going forward. And then most likely what we will do based on just the conversation we've had today is either as a part of the budget development process or even earlier, we will make sure to get in contact with all of these culture and rec and community development programs in those parts of the budget book. And we will make sure that they know what the opportunity is so that they can come and make a case with ROIs or other things. And the commission can make kind of that wholesale decision in the scope of overall budget so that you would have your department requests plus your community funding requests that you could look at at the same time.

Okay. And I guess, Stephanie, if you guys have any questions after this, message me. Yeah, call me. Hopefully. Commissioner Wise's point, I appreciate the process and trying to stay with the process and just hopefully, you know, continuous improvement, right?

Commissioner Howell. Thank you, Chairman. Just, I guess fundamentally, how is this different than the Extension Council? I don't see the difference. They both got the same haircut the same year. Again, we talked about consistency. If we're going to restore one, let's talk about restoring all of them. I mean, if that's the conversation we need to have. And again, I don't think there's any urgency to do this today. I think we, I mean, when is the Central County Affairs behind us for this year, correct? It's already happened.

Yep, I believe so.

Right. So we have until next year to figure out whether this is even needed. And once again, I have no knowledge about whether they've even tried to solve this problem without the $5,000 from the public sector. I would love to know what they've done to solve the problem independently. So I guess I just, I'm not ready to give them 5,000 today. I think that this is premature. I think we need to be, number one, let's be fair. Let's be consistent. Let's be thoughtful. Let's be measured. Let's not do it quickly. That doesn't mean they don't have a – not saying they wouldn't use the $5,000, but is this the only way to solve this problem is with property tax dollars? I'm just not ready to go forward, Mr. Chairman.

Okay. If you don't mind, I'd like to bring Stephanie up to the podium. Stephanie, I just want to get a better idea as to how you guys covered your shortfall this year.

Like I said earlier, we sent out sponsorships and we asked our public for donations. That's how we covered the shortfall this year. Yes, we'll continue to do that, but as Representative Bluebaugh said, Councilman Bluebaugh said, is I would like to see us be able to improve our situation there at Sedway County Fair. Our youth who get a purple ribbon truly get $1.25 for the 2,000-pound steer that they walked into the ring. They get $1 if they get a blue. They get 75 cents if they get a red. The kids that are making their art projects, that's the same thing. The $5,000 that he's mentioning now, I sent an email after the fair sharing what my loss was this year. Yes, we did cover it through sponsorships. But I also feel like it's kind of I'm asking the parents that are paying for the project, like Mrs. Gruenbacher, to then sponsor us so we can celebrate the project and pay for the production.

So, Stephanie, I want to clarify. One of those show steers is probably $5,000.

Yes, exactly. And we give them $1.25 to get a purple ribbon.

And you also have a premium sale. Could you touch on that a little bit?

I'm not so much part of the premium sale because that's a different entity than myself. That's a different nonprofit. But they do have a, well, it's a terminal or premium sale. And the youth that show the animals have a choice. to take their steers, their meat, goats, their sheep, and their swine into the premium sale. And they have to go out and find what they call buyers, or people who will bid on that animal. And that is where they fundraise to continue the project.

So I just want everybody to have a good understanding of how that process works. They're raising the animal that they're going to go underwater on. They're not going to be able to sell that animal. They're not going to raise that animal and put all your high dollar protein feed into it and take it to a sale and sell it. So they have a premium sale that we look at it. like a scholarship program, that it goes back to the kid. And really, it's just trying to make them whole in what they have invested in it. And usually the parents will let them keep that and put it in their college account or something.

And it's a profit-loss situation. They all have to keep records on everything.

Okay. Does anybody else have any other questions? Okay.

Thank you so very much. Sure. Thanks.

Okay. Appreciate everything you guys have done here, the advocacy. I'm going to go ahead, and if we don't have any other questions, I'm going to go ahead and call the roll. Okay. Madam Clerk?

Commissioner Meitzner? Aye. Commissioner Beatty? Aye. Commissioner Howe? Aye. Commissioner Weiss? Aye. Chairman Blum? I'm sorry.

I meant to say no. I apologize. The motion passes four to one.

Yeah, thank you. Okay. Next item. Who's next?

You ready?

Yeah.

Me?

Yeah. Okay.

I'm going to put my black jacket on because it's important stuff. This next one should not be too difficult, but we'll see what happens. You know, I'm not real thrilled about the Oakland Transit Services as they sit today. The ridership is down to roughly 312 riders per month, 3,748 riders per year. This program costs Cedric County taxpayers $38,795 per year. I would say that the... Oakland community is unique because they have really great socioeconomic needs, unlike most other communities across our great county. So I'm not suggesting we would not provide the funding. What I am suggesting is we give them a better option. This bus right now, we contract with Wichita because it's not inside the city of Wichita. We contract with Wichita to run their city bus through Oakland a couple times a day. And it doesn't run on the weekends. It doesn't run super early in the morning or super late in the evening. And so for people who do get to ride that bus, my guess is it may just be a one-way trip. It may not really provide a lot of opportunity for them to go to work, for example. And people in that community have a lot of transportation needs, and so I would just like to see us reconsider how we spend this money. I've talked for years about the idea of maybe having a voucher program instead. I'm not saying that it will even work, but we haven't really tried. So the motion, let me read the motion here. It says, within the Community Development Community Programs budget, I move that we direct staff... to do a competitive request for proposal process, or RFP, for providing transportation services for the Oakland area to include an evaluation of a potential voucher program through taxi service. This RFP process should begin immediately upon adoption of the 2027 budget, with the intent to have the program in operation by January 1st of 2027. So this is not a financial hit to the budget. It simply is directing staff to let's try to find a way to do this better, and that program hopefully would be something we can figure out if this is a solution. Again, if we don't find a solution that works, then the budget as is would still be in place. So it doesn't change that funding for the service if there's not a better option, but it does give us a chance to go take a look. So that's my motion, Mr. Chairman. Okay. Heard a motion.

Do we have a second?

I second that. That's a good idea.

We have a motion and a second. Discussion? Questions?

It's good.

Okay.

Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howell. Aye. Commissioner Wise. Aye. Chairman Bluwa.

Aye. Motion passes 5-0. Okay. Colleagues, thank you for that. I really appreciate that. Mr. Chairman, may I continue? Absolutely. Okay, so this one, I don't know that it's probably going to pass, but let me just make a point that I have talked with many legislators about the Highway Patrol hangar, and I believe that many of the legislators who voted for that did not know that they already have a hangar, and that's important information to note. They're going to go to the state paying a little bit less than $60,000 a year to hangar their two aircraft, which is at Cook Airfield, east of Derby. And they're going to go to that to a project that we are planning to build. It's in our CIP. And we will, if we don't take my motion today, then we're going to start spending money here in 2026 to design and start moving towards construction of a highway patrol hangar. I know there's lots of ways to slice and dice this budget, but I will argue that a reasonable way to look at this is it will cost Sedgwick County roughly $80,000 a year. and property tax funds that we will have to pay for to do the state a favor. Now, we already have an aircraft at Jabara. they would provide that hangar would be big enough for us to put our hangar in, and they would provide some maintenance to our airplane. So there's an offset, but our net effect, after all of that's taken into account, is roughly $80,000 a year to Sedgwick County taxpayers. First of all, I would say if the state wants us to do this, they should do two things. Number one, they should give us a contract that guarantees that they're not going to back out. Right now we have an MOU, and we have no guarantee that they won't back out in year two or three or four. The state, in my opinion, is fickle. and not to be trusted. In fact, I know that there's a governor race going on, and I would argue that I believe that the governor potentially will reconsider whether or not they even have a governor's plane. I know the governor's plane cannot land. Again, they might have a governor's plane, but it may not be a Citation jet. It might be a... 208 or might be a King Air. That's what they used to have. They used to have a King Air. We bought their King Air. And by the way, a King Air can land at different airfields, but a Citation Jet is, because it requires a much longer runway, it can only be landed at about 10% of the runways in Kansas. So there's limits on where the Citation Jet can land, whereas the King Air can go much more places. And so, again, the cost of operations has gone up because the state has moved to a much fancier jet. That jet will not ever land at Cook, but they currently can land that at Jabara or Eisenhower. They don't typically plan on spending the night here with airplanes, so unless there's inclement weather, it surprises people. There's not really a need to hangar the airplane most of the time. So this hangar is not about the governor's plane, and they'll actually tell you that. There's a question in the legislative discussion about whether this is for the governor's plane. In fact, I asked Eric Smith, our colonel of the Highway Patrol, if this is for the governor's plane, and they said no. So this is not for the governor's plane. This is not about the county plane. This is simply about the Highway Patrol's two planes. They're currently being hangared out by Easter Derby, which, by the way... The location of where they house these doesn't change the response time. The response time is the same. They actually also said they're committed to Central County regardless of where they hangar the planes. So response time is not an issue, and whether they're committed to Central County is not an issue. But the state's going to go from roughly $60,000 a year to over $600,000. I forget the exact number. I'll just round it off. $750,000 a year, roughly. I think it's 14 times the cost for the state of Kansas. The problem is the legislators who voted for that, and by the way, the governor did veto it, and it was overridden by the Republican legislature. But even during that time, I don't believe they realized there's actually already a hanger in play. We had a highway patrol here earlier. Thank you for their service. And they mentioned there's three places they operate out of. That's Hays, Topeka, and Wichita. I don't think that's going to change. We have more highway patrol calls in Wichita than any place else in the state of Kansas. This is where crime happens, and they want to be near where the responses are needed. Nothing's going to change. I'm concerned about this. If the state wants to do this, number one, they should pay us the full cost. Number two, they should give us a commitment we can agree to that actually protects our taxpayers here. We're being asked to sign a 50-year lease with the airport authority for the land and take on bonds for 20 years. What's the total bond value for that building, Lindsay? $43,000.

Say that again.

What's the bond value for the Highway Patrol? What's our bond?

$8.5 million would be the total cost.

Okay, $8.5 million for 20 years. So there's a lot of reasons, in my opinion, to slow this down. What I'm asking for us to do is to not start that process in 2026. Let's let the legislative session in 2027 reconsider this, which I think they're going to do. I've talked to lots of legislators, and they're like, had they known that, they would not have voted the way they did. It's not too late to give them a chance to reconsider whether this is right for the state of Kansas. So with that, my motion is we would shift the Joint Sheriff's Kansas Highway Patrol hangar facilities project from the capital improvement plan to the watch list pending the outcome of the upcoming 2027 legislative session. I'll stand for questions. Thank you, Chairman. Okay. We have a motion. Do we have a second?

Commissioner Brady? I'd just like to provide comment. We have talked about this a lot, and I appreciate Commissioner Howell's opinion. I just want to, for the public, remind the public that we have an elected sheriff that is recommending this approach. We have a colonel from the Kansas Highway Patrol that is recommending this approach. I don't buy the narrative that the legislature didn't know what they were doing. They went from a standing committee to a conference committee, and I've looked up every member of those committees. They're really, really smart people in that room. They had significant debate on these issues. Significant debate on these issues. These members on those committees are really smart people. Then it went to final action. Then it went to a governor veto. And the only reason Governor Kelly vetoed this is she wanted to buy a hangar, not lease the hangar. And the legislature overrode her because they don't want to buy a hangar. They want to work with the third party and lease a hangar. Kansas Highway Patrol has identified us as that party they'd like to work with so that they can keep Air Patrol in Wichita. There are two things that I have confirmed and has been said publicly. The first thing is the need is great here. It's over 310 times a year that they flew in 2025. We saw this morning video of some of these flights. It's an incredible need for the city of Wichita and Sedgwick County, an incredible need because it keeps officers safe and our public safe. So we know the needs there. The second thing that the colonel has publicly said is they are leaving Cook Airfield no matter what. They are leaving. And he confirmed it in a conversation yesterday. They are leaving Cook no matter what. So if they go, the option is they go to Eisenhower. That's too expensive for the taxpayer. Or they go to Jabbar. If Jabbar is not an option here, then they're going somewhere else. They will leave Wichita. And I think we need to understand that. They will leave Wichita. They want to be in Wichita. They need a third-party partner. And that's on directive of the state legislature that is guiding this decision. So I'm just not willing to say that the state legislature didn't know what they were doing. I think through all the processes, they knew exactly what they were doing. This is exactly what they wanted. And I think this is a great partnership with the Kansas Highway Patrol that I'm highly supportive of, not just because of the need, but the partnership and the intent that the legislature had. I think Cedric County can step up and provide this here. I think our citizens need it. To be quite frank, my biggest frustration in it all... is that 98% of these calls are going to be in the city of Wichita. We couldn't get the city of Wichita to partner with us on any of this. That's my biggest frustration in this, is they very much, they're grabbing all their assessed value growth. They couldn't help us a bit in this, and this is being done, again, just like WSU, Mel Levy, on behalf of the city of Wichita. So that's my angst, is I'm frustrated that we didn't get partnership when 98% of the use is going to be for the city of Wichita. But that's fine. Our citizens need this, and I think we're willing to lead in this. I'm willing to lead in this and step up and take a vote for this. But our elected sheriff... He thinks this is the right move, and I concur. I think this is the right move for a lot of reasons. Right, Colonel? Okay. We have a motion. Do we have a second?

I have a comment.

You're not going to suck at your motion, all right? No. The motion dies for lack of a second.

Go ahead, Commissioner. I would like to at least provide a little bit more information about the same topic, if that's acceptable. But, again, this was added as a proviso during conference by Senator J.R. Clays. He's no longer a senator today. He's now gone to the federal government. But at the time, this was added as a proviso, which is a one-year piece of policy that's put into the budget bill. And again, there was information that was withheld from legislators. That ought to be alarming to everybody. My motion is not to say we're not going to do it. My motion is to delay it and to give the chance for the legislature to reconsider this potentially because there are some they said they did not know. So I'm not suggesting we don't do it. This idea that they have to leave Cook is actually in the comments that the, I think that the governor's speech when she I'm not exactly sure how this happened, but she made comments when she vetoed the bill. There was also some discussion in the actual budget bill regarding the fact that they have to build this in Jabara. I had a legislator actually ask legislative researchers if that really ties the hands, if there's no other options, and they said no. That is not the only option. Again, I love our sheriff. He's a great man, and he wants to have a great relationship with the Highway Patrol. Who wouldn't? I agree that it's nice to work together, but Highway Patrol did not intend for us to do this. The Highway Patrol intended this to be a third party. They came to Sedgwick County because they couldn't find anybody else interested to help. Why would they not help? Because it's going to cost us $80,000 a year and a 50-year obligation. So this idea that we had, this was done with transparency. Everybody knew exactly what was going on. I will challenge that right now. I don't believe that's correct. Anyway, the motion is to delay this. And if there's no second and there's no vote, that's totally fine. Mr. Chairman, I'm ready to move on when you're ready. Thank you. Commissioner Wise?

I'll follow up in the conversation. I do have an alternative motion that I'd like to share, but I'll share my thoughts first. I respect our sheriff and the colonel and what they've committed to and what they say the need is. I share a lot of the sentiments that Commissioner Beatty has already shared as well, but I do have a lot more questions. I know that we're only at a MOU stage right now. I would love to be well informed when we're negotiating what will be a lease I mean we're moving into the position of making sure that you know if we're going to be the landlord for this that we need to make sure that the rent and the commitment is there from the state and there's a lot more to do there so I'm going to make a different motion here And my motion would be that I move that we keep the Joint Sheriff Kansas Highway Patrol hangar facilities project in the capital improvement plan, but that we require staff to bring any and all expenses to the commission for approval prior to any expenses actually being made until otherwise directed by the commission. My hope with that is before we start spending money, we need to get some of these conversations further down the line. But I want to show the commitment to our sheriff and to the colonel that we want to do this with them. And we still got some work to do before we start spending some money on it. So I do want to keep it there. That is my motion.

Chairman. Yeah, I want to ask something real quick too. Justin, Commissioner Wise has made a motion. Does it conflict with item L that we're going to be hearing after budget adoption today?

Justin Weiner, County Councilor, Chairman. I'm looking to Lindsay just to double check, but I don't believe there's any conflict between those two.

No, the project authorization simply allows, you allow staff within your directives to staff to start spending money on projects and preserve our right to reimburse ourselves down the road. Okay, I'm just trying to be administrative. No, thank you for your diligence, but we're good.

Okay, Commissioner Beatty, go ahead.

I'll second that motion.

Okay, we have a motion and a second. Any other discussion? Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner. Aye. Commissioner Beatty. Aye. Commissioner Howell.

I suppose.

Commissioner Weiss? Aye. Chairman Blubaugh?

Aye. Motion passes 5-0. Commissioner Howell, do you still have some motions?

Yes, sir, I sure do. I'm not sure this is the right R number in this, but my motion number two, Lindsay, this is regarding a 372. That's what it says here. I don't think that's correct. Let me find it real quickly. I believe I can find it real quick. Maybe I'm wrong.

So R372 is the one at 21st and 167th?

You're right. It is R372. Okay.

We make it a habit, sir.

What this is is a traffic signal, and this is at 21st Street North and 167th Street West. And I'm not suggesting that traffic signal is not needed. What I'm squawking about is the cost. This is a $1.9 million program to signalize that intersection. And I would say, again, I believe that Wichita has annexed property on two corners, if I understand correctly. And there's more annexation going on. We used to have... traffic signals that were suspended with cables across the intersection that worked just fine. In fact, we have one right now at Rock Road and 55th Street South in my own district. I know there's a plan for us to work with Derby, and they're going to put the giant poles up, and they're going to improve the intersection at some point. We're not going to have to pay for all that at Derby, because it sounds like Derby's going to cover the cost. My question is, why are we covering that $1.9 million at this intersection? If all we need is a traffic signal, can we not put a signal in that's more cost-efficient? sensitive to seducing taxpayers, and we would encourage Wichita or other parties to provide whatever funding they want to make it better than that. But I think we have an option of making this a symbolized intersection, just not to that magnitude. So I'll stand for questions. I haven't read my motion yet, but I will be glad to read it whenever appropriate time. Let me go ahead and read my motion. I move that we shift the project R372, a road project to make intersection improvements to 21st Street North and 167th Street West from the 2027 and 2028 years of the capital improvement plan. Move that to the watch list instead with the intent of discussing the proposed improvements and find an alternative plan to address the intersection. Again, my intent is to make this more affordable. I'll stand for questions.

We have a motion. Do we have a second? Okay, motion dies for like a second.

Let me go on to another one then. Let's talk about interest bank arena. Okay.

Yeah, just a big sigh. I'm ready.

Interest Bank Arena has been in the news a lot lately. The Arena Reserve Fund is now basically dry, and we're talking about transferring a couple million dollars from our budget. I know there is a motion on the staff recommended motions to... No, that was another one. That's another one. Excuse me.

It's just in the recommended budget, sir.

It is.

For the $2 million transfer from that.

Yeah, right. But there was a motion. You wrote out a motion to use the interest from...

Yes, Commissioner Beatty and Commissioner... Okay.

We'll let them talk about that along, hopefully, alongside what I'm talking about here. Yes, sir. My intent is that, again, I'll just say this. I would rather see us look for a different revenue stream. Because if we use gaming revenue, if we use interest on our investments, if you will, those are dollars that are being used elsewhere in our budget already. We're simply moving, I use the word deck chairs all around the deck. We're not really solving the problem. Make us feel better if we use gaming revenue. But at the end of the day, there's still a property tax hit. And I'm suggesting we would not make this decision today. This is more of a delay motion. It's not saying we're not going to solve the problem. It's not saying we're going to allow the firm maintenance to stack up or we're going to lose the NCAA tournament. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about taking care of the building with revenues. Just not make that decision today. We have money in our reserve fund. We could do a, let me go ahead and read the motion. It says, I move that we remove a specific transfer of $2 million from the budgeted transfers to the Arena Reserve Fund, that's what's in the budget now, and instead allocate the budget authority to the Operating Reserve. That means it takes $2 million out of the budgeted transfers and puts it in the Operating Reserve. It just holds the money. That's all it does. In addition, I move that we direct staff to evaluate options for alternative funding mechanisms for capital needs at the facility to include conversations with the city of Wichita regarding the transient guest tax and tourism business improvement district tourism fees, as well as a legal review regarding other options that the county commission could do on its own. And I made some analysis the last couple days on this. It looks like if Wichita would levy 1.25% transient guest tax on our behalf, it would solve this problem entirely. It would not become a property tax problem. We don't have them committed to anything. We haven't even started the conversation yet. What this motion does, it gives us time to have that conversation. So I think that's a reasonable motion, Mr. Chairman. I'll stand for questions or hear an alternate motion if that's what you want to do. We have a motion. Do we have a second?

Do we have a second?

Motion dies for lack of a second. Commissioner Beatty? I'll make an alternative motion that everybody knew was coming, but this has been a really, really valuable conversation, not just for the commission and the county, but I think for the community to hear and listen. Here's what I think we have agreement on from the commission. The first thing is that the capital needs are the part of our responsibility. This is a public asset, which was the result of a public vote, The operational budgets are funded through Interest Bank Arena, and the operational budgets are fine. But the capital needs budget was something that we always knew the reserve was going to run out of, the emergency reserve. We always knew it was going to run out. We always knew this conversation and this was coming. Well, here is D-Day. Now we've got to figure out exactly what the mechanism is. So we all agree on that, and I'm thankful for that. The second thing I think we all agree on is that we want a different funding source, that we don't want to do this with property tax dollars. And that's a broader conversation of how do we do all of our cultural arts funding off of property taxes into a designated, determined, formulaic form of financing for the long term so that they're not vulnerable because of property tax conversations and the hesitancy to use property taxes. Commissioner Meitzner and several of the people at the county and other colleagues on the county commission talked about what could that funding source be. We have done very well, thank you to all those in finance, with our interest investment income. That is a source that helps us reduce the dependence on property tax revenue. If you had asked us six years ago if we thought this would be a source of revenue for the county, we all probably would have said no. It is, and we're able to offset property tax use because of it. The second thing that we have is we have the Kansas Star Casino funds that come in that we can earmark and allocate. Commissioner Howell is right when he says, well, these are funds, well, they come in and we can utilize those in the budget to pay for all kinds of different things. What I'm hoping to do here is earmark these dollars so that we can say, hey, these dollars are used, the $2 million for interest bank arena in particular, until we find another source. And here's, I think, is the rub between our plans. Commissioner Howell wants to use contingency funds, or not contingency, operating reserve funds to be able to do this. Honestly, my kind of personal rule on using operating reserve funds is for capital projects and for one-time funding uses. So this would fit in that regard. The only problem is I'm not confident we can find another plan within a year. And then we're going to have to come back and either use operating reserve funds again... which further draws down, or we're going to have to come up with a creative option. So I just don't think we have it. I think we're probably going to need more than a year of a conversation to try to fix this problem ultimately. And I think this is a good short-term fix that signals to the community, this is how we fund this type of stuff. We're trying to get these off of property taxes and earmark them with other sources of revenue. So I think this is a good short-term fix. It's not designed to be a permanent fix. But it's a signal to the community is that we don't think property taxes and the general fund should be funding these types of things, that we want to try to find an alternative source. And we've got to get to work, which is part of the motion with the Arts Council, part of the motion with what we want to do, part of the request to Extension and our partners is we need your help. We've said it to Expiration Place a number of times. We need your help in these conversations to try to get a community solution moving forward. So here is my motion that would take the $2 million and what sources of revenue I want to use today. in the arena transfer. So I move that we adopt a prepared resolution that earmarks up to $2 million to be transferred from the County General Fund to the Reserve Fund from the following sources. First, gaming revenues that are generated by the Kansas Star Casino, and then the balance from investment income earned in excess of $8 million in a year. As a final resort, the balance may be earmarked from retail tax collections, but this must be reported to the commission if it's deemed necessary. The resolution will expire if the county adopts a budget with an alternative revenue stream to support the transfer or by 2032, whichever is earliest. So that's my motion. And you can hear we're trying to designate and earmark specific funding sources for this purpose. And we're trying to put a timeline on it so it gives us some expediency of how we approach these things. So that's a motion.

Okay. We have a motion. I'll second that motion. We have a motion to second the discussion. Commissioner Howell.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So, curiously, where does the gaming revenue go now?

General fund.

And we use it to do what? Pretty much everything?

It is fungible, and so it is used to support general operating expenses.

So if we take the money out of gaming revenue and redirect it towards this, what's the net effect of the general fund?

In this case, because we already have a financial forecast that includes the $2 million expense, if we use this as the revenue to support that expense, it just mitigates the deficit that otherwise would be in the general fund.

So, again, it's my comment that this is still hitting at property taxes. It's my explanation. Some people don't like me saying that, but I would say this is still going to hit our property tax fund. That's where it's ultimately going to be born is through property tax, if that's what we do. Okay, I'd ask the maker of the motion. Is there some urgency to do this today?

I appreciate that. I didn't mean to over speak. I'm sorry. I think there is. I think that we need to signal their stability in the fund. I think we need to signal to the NCAA tournament that's coming in the world that we'll be watching. And I think we need to signal to the community that we are serious about finding alternative sources of revenue. That we don't think property taxes is the appropriate use for cultural assets. That we want to find another stream of revenue. And this is an earmark that helps us signal to the community exactly that. I think this helps in our conversation moving forward. That we are already taking steps. of doing exactly this and earmarking these kind of funds. So there is some expediency. I would say I just, and this sounds pessimistic. I don't want to be a pessimistic person from the board, but I just am not confident we're going to have a solution wrapped up in a year. I'm just not. And we're going to have to come back and either use this reserve fund again, the operating reserve fund again, or try to make up the gap. And I'm just, I'm not as confident. I think we're going to need a little bit of time to bake this thing in.

My concern is, is that by solving it this way, well, first of all, let me make a point. This venue is a county facility because the city of Wichita tried a couple times to get this done, couldn't get it done. And the county stepped up and did it on behalf of the city. And the county did a good job. The facility is pristine. It's like a brand new facility. It's been perfectly maintained. My hope is that regardless of this decision today, people will realize we're committed to the facility. We're going to take care of the taxpayer's asset. That's not going to change. The question is where do we find the revenue? If we do it this way, if I was on Wichita City Council, I would tell the county to go pound sand at this point. Why would they start a guest tax for us when they need the revenue when we've already solved the problem? By delaying this, it allows the conversation to happen. I think if we don't carve out some time, our ability to negotiate a real long-term solution with Wichita using guest tax is gone. So my opinion is this is, we're solving it substantially today, and this is going to lock it in. And I don't think Wichita is going to have that conversation with us at that point. Again, this is an asset in the heart of the city. We did it for the city. Again, like we did, we do the 1.5 mils for the city, not because the county, 1.5 mils for Wichita State University, for the city. This is also for the city, and yet they don't have – we talked about the thing a minute ago with the hangar. They decided not to support the hangar. Our relationship with them is not as good as it could be. This is one of those things where if they want to step up and help us with an asset that's, frankly, for them in the heart of the city, this is a chance to have that conversation. But we substantially solved these property taxes today, make us feel better, but it's still property taxes. I don't know why would they come to the table and negotiate at that point. We've solved the problem. Thank you, Chairman. Commissioner Beatty.

I would just say, I don't think we approach it as a negotiation. We're not negotiating with the city of Wichita. We're coming to the table and trying to find a modernized approach. They have needs, too. And I think they will acknowledge, and I know the mayor has acknowledged, and the bulk of the council over there has acknowledged, we need to find more synergy in these things. We need to have the conversation. I'm the county's representative on Visit Wichita. They are all open to this conversation as well. I don't see this as a negotiation. I see this as coming together to modernize our approach that will benefit what's going on in the city of Wichita and the downtown core. And remember, there's a lot going on in downtown. We have a $300 million biomed school coming. We've got a $400 million private development project that's coming. There's a lot going on. And they are incentivized to want to come together and try to figure out how we can make sure the long-term funding of interest bank arena remains a top-tier asset that will draw national and worldwide attention. And we were intended to do that. So I don't see it as a negotiation. I see this as a partnership and a good collaboration and And I'm hopeful in that regard. I just don't think we can get it done in a year. I think this is a broader conversation.

Good. We have a motion and a second. Any other discussion? Madam Clerk, please call the roll.

Commissioner Meitzner? Aye. Commissioner Beatty?

Aye.

Commissioner Howe? No. Commissioner Wise? Aye. Chairman Bubba?

Aye. Motion passes 4-1. Do you have any more, Commissioner? We have a couple more.

Sorry. Does anyone else have a motion? Yeah, I can wait until somebody else has a motion. That's fine.

That's fine.

Okay. Go ahead. This is one I don't think will pass, but I firmly believe this is reasonable. It's a very small amount of money. I'll just read the motion. I make a motion that we eliminate the .225 FTE from the highway department engineering intern position and reallocate the associated $15,604 of funding to the highway contingency fund. Highway contingency and the highway fund. And I'm doing that because... It's new spending. We don't have to do this. We are training people and we're letting them leave our organization. If we want to hire them, we should hire them if there's an FTE position available. We do OJT. This is a benefit for someone who's getting college credit that's not necessarily committed to Central County. If we have a need for someone to do this job, we should hire someone to do the position. I don't like the idea of training somebody that, frankly, doesn't come in with the knowledge and experience. We train them. They depart. We don't know that they will depart. We don't know what's going to happen to these people. But, again, this is new spending. I don't think we have to do this. So I would make that motion that we eliminate this intern position.

Okay. We have a motion. Do we have a second? We have a motion. We have a second. Okay. Motion dies for lack of a second.

Mr. Chairman, I have one more if you want to go through that.