FORT SCOTT — The Bourbon County Commission adopted its 2027 budget Monday night with 5% built in for an employee pay increase, after a push for much larger raises went nowhere and a motion to set raises aside until 2027 died without a second. Later in the meeting, a proposal to raise transfer-station rates for the first time in the station’s 10 years died without a second.

Chairman Gregg Motley presided, with Commissioners Joe Allen, David Beerbower, Mika Milburn-Kee and Samuel Tran, budget consultant Matt Lawn and County Clerk Ann Clarkson. The county’s recording of the meeting begins as the board returned from its first executive session at about 5:54 p.m. Coming out of that session, the commission voted to give Tran authority to ask Dr. Cohen of HR Solutions On Call, the county’s human resources contractor, to come handle personnel matters in person. It then went back into a 20-minute executive session to consult County Counselor Bob Johnson and an attorney for the county’s insurance carrier, both by phone, about pending litigation, and returned with no action.

Budget adopted at 56.678 mills

Lawn said his latest version brought the 2026 estimates closer to the budgeted amounts, which increases the carryover reserves in the general, employee benefit, and road and bridge funds. He also gave commissioners a sheet showing what raises of 5% up to 15% would cost. Milburn-Kee said the larger raises would take more than three and a half mills, and Lawn said they would deplete most of the county’s carryover reserves. “I still think your best plan to go forward is to do a real wage study and build a step system off that,” Lawn said.

Beerbower proposed a 15% raise for employees who are not directors or elected officials, which he estimated at about $500,000. He would pay for it with the roughly $200,000-plus difference between the revenue-neutral rate and the adopted rate plus cuts to each department’s commodities budget, and would put the remaining FEMA money and the Jayhawk Wind PILOT revenue into the general fund as a cash reserve. Milburn-Kee noted that commodities include fuel, which is already rising.

“The guy that comes to work every day and hasn’t seen a raise in 10 years, that’s the guy I’m talking about,” Beerbower said. “And it’s really easy to see. All you got to do is look at the payroll.”

Tran said the county still has no plan for who should be paid what. A pay study that human resources was supposed to produce this year never arrived, he said, and “if we didn’t follow up on them, that’s on us.” Beerbower said HR had promised him the study in 60 days back in March.

Motley agreed with Tran that the county needs “a program, not a no raises for three years and 15%” — one that rewards effort and performance and fits the market for each job. “Let’s do it right. Let’s just wait on big raises or anything like that until we can get this done correctly.” He said Standard & Poor’s has criticized the county for inconsistent pay changes and equipment reserves. Tran pointed to another issue on his radar: “Somewhere in this whole thing, we’ve got to come up with $22.5 million. We haven’t even talked about that.”

Allen said he has supported 5% from the beginning. “I think 5% is reasonable. It’s not excessive. And I think these employees deserve that 5%.”

Tran then moved to table all pay-raises until 2027, when he hoped the county would have a plan for step increases and employee benefits. The motion died for lack of a second.

Lawn said the budget as written keeps the 56.678-mill total and includes 5% for pay and 20% for rising insurance costs. Milburn-Kee objected that the budget has only four expenditure line items; Lawn said most operating funds are set up that way, which he called time consuming and “very problematic.” Milburn-Kee moved to adopt the budget as written, not to exceed 56.678 mills. It passed on a voice vote, with Beerbower voting no. Lawn said he would have it submitted by the end of the day Wednesday, the state’s Sept. 30 deadline.

Grant, fund transfer and other business

Emergency Manager Lou Howard asked the board to approve the Emergency Management Performance Grant application, a 50-50 federal and county cost share that can pay for salary, office supplies, technology, planning and required exercises. Commissioners authorized Motley to sign it. Howard said she will bring back the county’s Emergency Operations Plan once it is finished.

On behalf of Public Works Director Kenny Allen, the board approved moving $325,000 from the Road and Bridge Sales Tax Fund to the Road and Bridge Fund to cover payroll. Milburn-Kee asked that the record show the money was for work done on hard-surface roads.

The commission also approved $1,750 for the  indigent cremation of William Watson, to be paid through accounts payable from the general fund.

Milburn-Kee invited representatives from Murphy Tractor to the table and thanked them for a detailed report on training and calibration work done for the county, which she said, citing figures Murphy gave her, helped raise the county crusher’s output from 400 tons a day to 3,600. “When we purchase this expensive equipment, the value isn’t just in the machinery,” she said. “The value is in our relationships with the vendors that are providing us those services as well.” Roland Hammond, Murphy Tractor’s regional product support manager, told commissioners that going forward, the company will communicate better before, during and after repairs. Motley suggested Hammond meet with Public Works Director Kenny Allen, the county’s main point of contact; Hammond said the two had not met.

In other action, the board:

• approved having TEC reorder the county’s phone prompts at no charge, to correct the problem of too many overflow calls going to the clerk’s office;
• approved sending Allen County a memorandum of understanding on the shared county appraiser, under which Bourbon County would pay its share of the appraiser’s health insurance monthly rather than yearly; Milburn-Kee said the shared insurance a big savings for the county;
• gave Bourbon County Clay the board’s blessing to enter an ornament representing the county in the Kansas Association of Counties’ governor’s tree competition.

Purchasing policy goes back for input; no action on insurance

The draft purchasing policy calls for price comparisons under $2,500, three quotes from $2,500 to $9,999, three written quotes from $10,000 to $24,999, and a formal bid or request for proposals at $25,000 and up. Beerbower said those thresholds are too low, noting that a patrol car tops $55,000 and a dump truck $180,000. He suggested thresholds he said similar counties use: department authority up to $10,000, three documented quotes from $10,000 to $50,000, formal competitive quotes from $50,000 to $100,000, and a request for proposals with board approval above that, which he said lines up with a Kansas legislative move to raise county construction thresholds from $25,000 to $100,000. He also recommended using state contracts that let counties buy at the state’s bid price. Clarkson said most employees’ purchase cards have a $1,000 limit, and that at the sheriff’s office everyone carries one. Tran said department heads may need higher limits but not every cardholder should have them: “If you give them the limit, they’ll take it. I’m not saying everybody, but I’m saying somebody will sometimes.” Motley will send the versions of the policy to department heads and elected officials for their feedback.

Updating the purchasing policy of the county is intended to meet the goals of consistency and transparency, according to Milburn-Kee and Beerbower.

Milburn-Kee’s proposal to move to a flat county contribution toward employee health insurance, with a $2-an-hour premium payment for employees who have insurance elsewhere and decline county coverage, drew questions from Beerbower about workers’ compensation and KPERS. Motley said he has received “some pretty vitriolic replies” from elected officials and department heads who fear losing employees who came for the benefits if Milburn-Kee’s proposal is implemented. “We have single moms, people like that, that would lose a lot of money,” he said. Milburn-Kee said 64 employees are on employee-only coverage and 18 on employee-plus plans. No action was taken.

Beerbower said a contractor will look at the work for the courthouse move Wednesday, Sept. 30, and that an inspection is set for Tuesday.

Records-request fees

The commission adopted a resolution setting copy fees of 50 cents a page for Kansas Open Records Act (KORA) requests and assigning each county office responsibility for its own records rather than routing every request through the clerk’s office. Before the vote, commissioners Joe Allen and Beerbower discussed leaving the decision about fees for fulfilling requests to each elected officials’ offices, giving the Sheriff’s Office as an example of a county entity that sets its own fee schedule for records requests. “I think y’all need to take some time reading the statute,” Milburn-Kee said.

County Clerk Annie Clarkson reminded the commission that adding signed documents to the published agenda is a step towards the transparency needed to reduce the number of KORA requested records. She mentioned that some people don’t like to retrieve their own documents, “But, KORA request also says if they’re already available to the public, then we’re not required to fill that KORA request.”

Motley said Bob Johnson, the commission’s attorney, told him Allen County received three records requests last year, and that Bourbon County is “getting a lot of frivolous” ones. Tran agreed: “It’s KORA lawfare. They’ll file it just to do lawfare against whatever it is that they don’t like. And that’s fine. That’s their right to do that. But it is bogging down the mechanism.” Clarkson pointed out that Allen County charges more to fulfill requests than Bourbon County does.

Beerbower moved to adopt the resolution, and it passed on a voice vote, with Joe Allen voting no.

Transfer station: rates, hours and a profit-and-loss question

Beerbower answered concerns raised at earlier meetings by Kevin “Skitch” Allen, owner of Skitch’s Hauling & Excavation, who uses the transfer station. Allen had asked for the station to open for four hours on minor holidays because “the trash doesn’t stop.” Beerbower said the station has only three trained employees and already leaves one person alone on Saturdays, which he called a safety and liability problem. He said they could re-asses after the landfill is fully staffed. Kevin Allen pushed back saying that the landfill has historically been open on minor holidays until about a year ago when that service stopped. Allen also suggested opening the scales at 7 a.m. instead of 8, since the scale operator arrives at 7; Beerbower said the early staff are preparing the site for the day. Allen then suggested that some of the work done at the beginning of the day could be done at a later time.

Allen also asked how the county knows the station is breaking even before it raises rates. “How do you know you’re breaking even is my question,” he said. Beerbower said the transfer station is a service “not designed to make a profit,” that he could find no year in its 10 years of operation when it went over budget, and that its rates have not gone up since it opened while its costs have. Motley read the station’s results from the county audit: a $96,000 gain in 2025, a $3,000 loss in 2024, and gains of $68,000 in 2023 and $22,000 in 2022. He cautioned that government cash-basis accounting leaves out equipment depreciation. “That’s apples and oranges to the typical business, but it’s been within budget, and it’s operated well,” Motley said.

Allen and Beerbower also disagreed over the station’s backhoes and over Allen’s suggestion to buy a pressure washer, which Beerbower said would need a pad with environmental drainage to meet state rules. Beerbower said he would check with the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.

Beerbower then moved to raise rates effective Jan. 1, 2027: in-county construction and demolition waste from $35 to $40 a ton, in-county trash from $40 to $46, out-of-county construction and demolition from $40 to $51, and out-of-county trash from $50 to $56. He said the station handles about 12,925 tons a year, bringing in about $520,000, and that comparable facilities commonly charge $57 to $60 a ton for trash. The motion also included a 15% raise for the station’s four employees and restricted reserves of $35,000 a year for equipment and facilities, $15,000 for closure and post-closure costs and $15,000 for operating carryover. It died for lack of a second.

Backhoe bids were held until next week while Public Works confirms that the Foley quotes are still current. Future agenda items include the backhoe bids, possibly employee IT training once Stronghold sends its information, responses to the county’s request for proposals for human resources services, which Joe Allen said number three or four so far, and an update on the courthouse asbestos work and the court’s move.

FORT SCOTT — Bourbon County commissioners spent part of their Sept. 21 meeting trying to work out when they had agreed to shift money between funds in the 2027 budget. They never voted on it, and they did not agree about what their earlier discussions had settled. Meeting video and the county’s own minutes show how the idea moved forward over four meetings without a vote.

Aug. 24: a stated goal, no vote

Commissioner Mika Milburn-Kee described what she wanted from the budget: “keep everybody exactly where they’re at, revenue neutral, but us take the assessed valuation increase of that two mil and put it in the reserves in the general fund” (video, 52:45). She put that growth at “approximately $300,000, a little bit less.” The only vote on the 2027 budget that night authorized publishing the hearing notice. The minutes, approved Sept. 9, record the idea as “the Commission’s overall objective.”

Aug. 31: a new recommendation, with Tran absent

A week later, budget consultant Matt Lawn of Baker Tilly recommended “lowering that mill levy” for Road and Bridge “by about four mills and then essentially pushing those mills back into general fund and the employee benefit fund,” using one-time FEMA reimbursement money in the road fund (video, 23:20). He said the plan was based on “some requests that I’ve got from you guys.”

Commissioner Samuel Tran was absent. The commission took no vote on the recommendation. County Treasurer Jennifer Hawkins cautioned that part of the road fund’s balance predates the FEMA reimbursements and that some is needed to match bridge grants. The minutes say the commission directed that her reconciliation of those funds “be completed before any mill reallocation is finalized.”

Sept. 14: the shift shows up in the numbers

After the revenue-neutral rate hearing, Lawn walked through how mills had been moved between funds while the total levy stayed flat: up 2.313 mills in the employee benefit fund and down 1.134 mills in Road and Bridge, among other changes. He said the Road and Bridge cut was smaller than first proposed because some of the FEMA money was “already spoken for” and some had to stay in its special project fund, and that the changes were made “based on council priorities.” The commission voted 5-0 to exceed the revenue-neutral rate but did not adopt the budget. Later that night, all five commissioners, Tran among them, voted to approve the Aug. 31 minutes describing Lawn’s recommendation.

Sept. 21: “When and where do we change our mind?”

When Lawn described moving Road and Bridge money into the employee benefit fund, Tran objected. “That’s the last thing I remember the five of us talking about,” he said of the general fund plan. “We agreed to that, all of us, unanimously” (video, 12:26). “I just want to know when and where do we change our mind on this.”

Milburn-Kee said she was “fine with general.” Lawn said he was “merely saying what Commissioner [Milburn-Kee] asked me to consider” and was open to whatever the board wanted. Tran asked who had directed the change. “Projections. Nobody directed,” Milburn-Kee said, explaining that Lawn had projected what Road and Bridge would overspend in 2026 and carried that forward (video, 13:20).

About 25 minutes later, Commissioner David Beerbower said he did not remember that discussion at the table. “Did we vote?” he asked. “No,” Tran said. “We never voted because we weren’t voting at the time. It was just a consensus like, hey, that’s a good idea” (video, 37:42). He said two commissioners had liked the idea, “so I kept it in the back of my head.”

“To be fair for Matt, we’re throwing him all over the place because we haven’t voted on a single thing,” Milburn-Kee said.

Tran then told Lawn that direction should come only from the full board. “Any marching orders that you get should come from the table,” he said. “It should always come from the table where there’s a consensus. … We rule as a body, not as a single person” (video, 38:35).

“To be fair to him again, we haven’t made any motion here,” Milburn-Kee said of Lawn. “He’s just listened to all the conversations and tried to build something.”

What’s next

The allocation also bears on raises: the draft includes a 5% wage increase across departments, and Milburn-Kee pressed Lawn on whether it rests on one-time money. Lawn agreed to bring about four versions of the budget. The budget must be adopted by Sept. 30, and the commission’s next regular meeting is Sept. 28. Full coverage of the Sept. 21 meeting is also available.