Below are two lists of property owners from 2008 and 2009 who had unpaid taxes (at the time this report was run) but were not properly published in the paper. Since the bid off process was not started, the county has never begun the redemption period so the properties will not be able to go to auction until the redemption period has expired from the date that the properties are published in the paper. As Mr. Meara has pointed out, given the interest rate, there would be no economic benefit to delay payment on these taxes.
Since the point in time that this list was created from the computer system, several individuals have come in and paid their taxes. Others may do so before the list is actually published in the paper. Those properties will not be listed when the publication does occur, so it should be expected that whatever is eventually published would only be a subset of the names listed here.
These two lists are fro 2007 taxes that should have been published in 2008 and 2008 taxes that should have been published in 2009. Mr. Meara has a similar list of properties that were not published when they should have been in 2007 for 2006 taxes. In last weeks meeting he said there were 17 to 25 names on that list. The clerks office said that Mr. Meara has another list from 2007 taxes that should have been published in 2008, however he did not mention those numbers at the commissioner’s meeting unless they were included in the 17 to 25 count.
2008
- Adams, Keshon
- Allen Contracting Co
- Auxier, David
- Bolling, Austin W
- Bower, Jason D x 2
- Bowman, Jonathan Dru & Cynthia
- Church, Carla D
- Cook, Kenneth D FS lot ($224.99)
- Delaney, Ronald L
- Derr, Jake
- Fleeman, Carl Wayne
- Foss, Earl x 2
- Foster, Libby x 2
- Harvest Ministries x 2
- Hemphill, Bruce E
- Home Solutions Partners x 2
- Kline Products of KS Inc
- Linker, Raymond C
- Loly, Elva
- May, Frances I
- McGinnis, Bonnie FS07367
- McPherson, August
- Meeks, Justin x 2
- Paulk, George
- Pulliam, Frank D
- Quick, Rodger M
- Quick, Thomas D
- Reed, Larry
- Robison, Charles W
- Schaub, Troy J x 2
- Sharp, Ruth P
- Tinsley, Mike x 2
- Weddle, Marvin A
- White, Vance & Christine
- Wilson, Clint A
2009
- All You Need Property Mgmt x 6
- BAC Tax Services Corp
- Bootjack Mining LLC
- Bowman, Arthur T III
- Bowman, Jonathan Dru
- Bownes, Christopher
- Button, Sharon K
- Claar, Lois C
- Clark, Tim L x 2
- Clasen, Norbert E
- Core Logic Tax Services
- Coulter, Ronnie
- Cowen, Marcia x 8
- Crawford, Hazel x 3
- Crossland, Dwayne D
- Derr, Jake
- Erie, Joseph H
- Evans, David Eugene
- Fanning, Max
- Fanning, Max & Mary
- Findley, Jason J
- Forester, Robert E
- Grant, Eric
- Hartman, Terry J FS07357
- Hencey, Gary W
- Home Solutions Parnters x 4
- Hoyt, William J
- Jackson, Robert Lloyd x 2
- Larabee, Patrick E
- Loyd, Elva
- Page, Juanita
- Paulk, George E
- Price, Jim & Donna
- Priest, Ea rl D
- QuIck, Rodger M
- Quick, Thomas D x 5
- Robison, Charles W
- Ruggles, Albert
- Schaub, Troy J x 2
- Speer, Johnny K Jr
- Stewart, Donald L
- Stucky, Mahlon & Jamie
- Tracy, Bertie L
- White, Vance x 2
- Wilson, Clint A
- Wilson, Jeremy A
- Yadan, Mohit
- Yoder, Chris Y
- Yount, Catherine J
- Yount, Leah
I see that Justin Meeks paid 2009 and not 2008 and I thought that all payments had to be applied to the oldest tax on the books. Isn’t he the one that went forward with the County Treasurer in 2010 and together (both with delinquent taxes) told the County Commissioners that there were not enough properties delinquent to justify a tax sale? As I understand it, no documentation for this opinion was given to the County Commission. And, when I roughly added up the appraised value of the delinquent properties, just the few I could actually find, it totaled around $600,000? Starts to all come together? A lot of these properties wouldn’t end up like this if the City would enforce the Codes against some of these slum lords!
According to the law, payments are applied to the oldest unpaid taxes first–except if you live in on particular county near Kansas City where it is applied to the most recent bill first. The treasurer was not aware of this until recently and they would let you apply the taxes to whatever year you liked. The Kansas Treasurer Association website had copied the statute from the website of the one county that is an exception and was telling everyone that the most current bill must be paid first.
The only advantage I can see of paying a more recent tax bill first is if the older tax bills were at a lower tax rate. Or I suppose it might keep your name out of the paper for the more current year.
Regarding the people who suggested that there wasn’t enough properties to do a tax sale, that would be a conflict of interest IF they had property that would have been sold at the auction.
I just noticed that Justin Meeks x 2 appears under 2008 here but if you go to the county website, that is where I am seeing 2009 paid but 2008 not. Also there is an entry where a first half isn’t paid but the second half is. It is small amounts on Hidden Valley plats but…………..Should I dare bothering to see how far off the others are on the list? Hopefully, between the auditor and the AG, this can all be sorted out.
I understand that it would probably not be illegal but there is no “IF” per page 5 of the audit, it states the Treasurer paid 2006 taxes on 6/22/11 but I guess we could just say that had probably nothing to do with the recommendation?
I may have mis-spoke. Conflict of interest may only apply to voting or making contracts with a company that you have a financial interest in. If conflict of interest isn’t adequately disclosed and the elected official abstain from voting, it appears they forfeit their position.
Regarding making a recommendation that keeps your property from going to tax sale, that doesn’t appear to be something that is addressed in the conflict of interest laws. The are obviously some ethical implications, but it may not be illegal.
Mark: Many lessons will be learned from this fiasco including taking a long hard look when recommendations are made and asking for the supporting documentation or at least I would hope so. Also, I can’t help but say that since contracts for the payment plans were VERY difficult to obtain, then all the sudden they surfaced and many had no dates/signatures, that maybe indeed these people were all on or not on the payment plan if there was a payment plan and not just partial payments because a payment plan without payments being made really isn’t a “payment” plan and really isn’t a plan revolving around payments but something that was acting as a “smoke screen”.
I can’t speak to other’s experience, but I filed a request for a copy of the payment plan contracts and had them a day or two later. It cost some money, but the process was very easy and fast.
If I remember correctly, the two meetings that I attended early on, no copy of a payment plan contract had been produced which is why it is was doubtful that such a thing even existed. Not even a blank one was shared at the start. Wouldn’t you have thought that one could have been produced, even a blank one at a minute’s notice? Well, I do! This was supposed to be a program where if you asked, you could be put on it.
OK, another thought is that the documents that you got came about a month after the confrontation between Ms. Quick and Mrs. Kramer and it took a week to produce a list of names of those on the payment plan, I believe 163 or 143, I’m too lazy to look up exact numbers this morning but then the latest number I heard that were on the payment plan was, I believe, 223 and this was after the commission suggested that the plan not take on new “members”? Then, with the audit, we learn like 94%, maybe more, were not making regular payments to their payment plan and some never made a payment, never signed a contract. Thus, my conclusion that there was no payment plan, just simply about 5% of the people who decided to make monthly partial payments and if that isn’t the case, that is what it amounted to. Think the First Loan Bank Of Bourbon County and one thing that isn’t being considered is that while one has to pay interest (well, some of them) that interest rate is still much lower than a credit card and would have been an available loan to those unable to secure credit to cover the other expenses that they were using the money that should have went for taxes. Not to mention, the ability to delay a tax sale and slide the sale a little further from November in 2009 to maybe February for the sale in 2012 giving even more time to those that are delinquent. Talk about milking the system!
Regardless of any type of payment plan, people still have at least three years to pay taxes on homestead property before it gets sold. Payment plans as allowed by law aren’t supposed to change this. The advantage of a payment plan is that the county may be able to collect some of the taxes due before the person stops paying so when the property does go to the tax sale the county has at least part of the taxes collected.
“The Kansas Treasurer Association website had copied the statute from the website of the one county that is an exception and was telling everyone that the most current bill must be paid first.”
Mark, are you quoting someone from the KTA? Even for a lay person, that law was very clear to me. I find it amazing that no other County Treasurer in our state, would not question that.
I wasn’t quoting anyone. I was referencing this section in their faq. Which says:
That is incorrect unless you are in Johnson County. You can find more details where I wrote about it about it here.