FORT SCOTT — The Bourbon County Commission appointed a new county appraiser it will share with Allen County, pushed adoption of the 2027 budget to its final possible week, and heard a longtime county employee tell commissioners that “you’re so far behind, you think you’re in first” on county employee wages at its regular meeting Monday night.

Commissioner Joe Allen presided as vice chairman; Commissioner Gregg Motley was absent. The commission amended its agenda at the start of the meeting to add the budget discussion, the courthouse relocation proposal and a second accounts payable list. Commissioners David Beerbower, Mika Milburn-Kee and Samuel Tran also took part, along with budget consultant Matt Lawn and County Clerk Ann Clarkson. The county’s livestream broke in the middle of public comments and resumed as a second recording (part 1, part 2); the two recordings run about two hours and 20 minutes in all.

Public comment: handouts, wages and the transfer station

Clint Walker, who said he has attended commission meetings for a decade, complained that handouts distributed at the table reach “only select people” and said that was why he did not speak at the Sept. 14 revenue-neutral-rate hearing: “I didn’t have documents to review to make an intelligent decision or conversation.” He tied that to the county’s volume of open-records requests, picking up a remark he said he had heard the chairman make on the radio. “We have the highest number of KORA requests. The reason we have the highest number of KORA requests is because we’re not getting the information coming out here,” he said. “The worst thing you can do is withhold information” (part 1, 7:09). Milburn-Kee said the new “executed documents for record” item on the agenda, posted on the county’s digital public agenda calendar, is meant to answer that by sharing the online access point in the published agenda.

Bob Reed, who introduced himself as a longtime Bourbon County employee, taxpayer and property owner, said he was speaking “as a voice for the employees” and asked the commission to act on wages immediately (part 1, 9:06). He said the county has given an across-the-board raise “about every six to eight years,” and that benefits once offered in lieu of raises: no-cost insurance for single employees, free dumping, extra holidays and longevity bonuses, have all been lost in the past year except the holidays. A single employee now pays $135 a month for insurance and an employee with a spouse $400, he said, “on a $16 to $19 wage.”

“Us employees get told every year we can’t afford raises. However, we can afford the three P’s,” Reed said. “What are the three P’s? Pet  political projects.” “At Public Works alone, the director would have to cut back $73,000 a year to give his employee a dollar raise,” he said, adding that studies he did as a department head reached the same conclusion as everyone else’s: “You’re so far behind, you think you’re in first.” He asked for raises across the board and a step-increase system, and said the incentive being discussed for employees who decline county insurance would penalize those who take a benefit “that historically has been provided” by other employers. When told his 3 minutes to speak were up, he concluded with the exhortation, “Don’t talk about it. Just do it.”

Kevin “Skitch” Allen, who owns Skitch’s Hauling & Excavation and hauls to the county transfer station, returned to ask whether the commission had a response to the transfer-station suggestions he made in the Sept. 14 meeting: foam-filled tires and air conditioning for the backhoe, and half-day openings on some holidays (part 2, 0:40). Joe Allen said the board had not met since and the items were not on the agenda. Tran said one commissioner’s opinion “doesn’t mean much when you need a consensus of at least the majority,” and that the request belonged on an agenda rather than in public comment if action is what’s wanted. “I just think that any citizen deserves an answer, eventually,” Kevin Allen said. Beerbower said he would put the items on a future agenda, and did so at the end of the meeting, along with a transfer-station rate discussion.

A new appraiser, shared with Allen County

After a five-minute executive session on appraiser employment, the commission authorized Milburn-Kee to continue onboarding. Later in the meeting it adopted Resolution 30-26 appointing Danielle Louk, a Kansas Registered Mass Appraiser, as Bourbon County Appraiser effective Sept. 21 for the unexpired term ending June 30, 2029 (part 2, 1:11:41). The resolution, included in the agenda packet, authorizes a memorandum of understanding with Allen County for shared appraiser services, with Louk’s compensation and benefits administered under that agreement. Milburn-Kee moved, Beerbower seconded, and the resolution passed with no opposition. The resolution repeals Resolution 20-25. Milburn-Kee asked to put the Allen County MOU on next week’s agenda.

The office had been vacant since former appraiser Matt Quick’s resignation took effect Aug. 18. Commissioners interviewed candidates at a special meeting Sept. 14.

Budget: adoption next Monday, and a fight over road money and raises

Lawn told the board the budget must be adopted by Sept. 30, which leaves only next Monday’s meeting (part 2, 10:50). Milburn-Kee asked that Road and Bridge’s 2026 spending estimate be lowered to the amount originally adopted, a difference Lawn put at about $240,000, with the corresponding mills moved to the employee benefit fund or the general fund rather than left to Road and Bridge spending authority.

Tran said the last thing he remembered the full commission agreeing on was to put the growth in assessed valuation into the general fund. “I just want to know when and where did we change our mind on this,” he said. Milburn-Kee said nobody had directed a change: Lawn had projected what the department would overspend in 2026 and carried that forward. Beerbower said he did not remember the board discussing the benefit-fund idea 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.” Milburn-Kee added: “To be fair for Matt, we’re throwing him all over the place because we haven’t voted on a single thing” (part 2, 37:42).

“There’s five of us and five different ideas,” Tran told Lawn. “Any marching orders that you get should come from the table. It should always come from the table where there’s a consensus.”

Lawn said the proposed budget includes a 5% wage increase across all departments. Beerbower said he would like it higher. “5% is not much, not considering where we’ve been and how long it’s been to get here,” he said, adding that he had run his own numbers for a 15% increase at Public Works and, with benefits, arrived at about $120,000 because the department has fallen from 38 employees to about 31. Tran put a 15% increase on the department’s projected $1,406,633 in wages at $210,994. Milburn-Kee pressed Lawn on where the money for a 5% raise comes from if the valuation growth is being set aside unencumbered; Lawn said it comes from all revenue sources, including sales tax transfers and fund balance, and that he budgets “holistically at total revenue versus total expenditure” rather than matching each increase to a revenue line (part 2, 28:33).

Milburn-Kee said her larger fear is spending authority built on one-time revenue: the FEMA reimbursement, about $412,000 of which is being transferred into Road and Bridge this year, and a carryover balance Lawn projects will grow from about $130,000 to about $621,000. “We learn to operate at this capacity, and then we have to…” she said. Tran put the consequence plainly: “We can spend that money this year, but if you don’t refund that money or get more money in next year, you’re going to raise the mill.” Beerbower argued the opposite risk: “You keep running everything flat [pay rate] and everything else around you keeps going up. Four years from now, you’re going to be way down here and you’re going to have to have an enormous raise.” Lawn called that “valid, absolute valid criticism” and said next year’s budget “will have to look different than this one” if one-time money is used for operations. He agreed to bring four scenarios by Wednesday, moving the disputed authority to an equipment reserve, to the general fund, or splitting it. Lawn also urged the board to create a step program for wages and positions and to take “a stronger role in approving expenditures,” since budget authority is not blanket permission to spend.

Tran asked Clarkson whether $60,500 budgeted for an election employee would stay in elections; she said it would.

Asbestos inspection Sept. 29, and who may attend

Beerbower said Apex Environmental and Otis Elevator will both be at the courthouse at 9 a.m. Sept. 29; Apex will inspect the elevator first to allow the Otis people to begin their work, then either the third-floor jury room or the basement, and will also look at the building at 108 W. Second St. (part 2, 49:22). The commission authorized signing the Apex agreement, whose proposal in the agenda packet lists $2,475 for the inspection and report and an estimated $1,050 for 30 samples at $35 each. The board capped the work at $5,000 on Sept. 2.

Beerbower said he planned to bring maintenance staff and “one citizen advisor that asked if he could come,” Michael Hoyt. Milburn-Kee moved that attendance be limited to employees, the elected official and the contractors; Tran seconded. Beerbower objected: “If there’s not a problem for us as individuals to go down there in all transparency, why wouldn’t it be all right?” Tran said the asbestos issue “has been known in this building for a while” and “became a controversy because somebody took it and broadcast it all over the news prior to coming to the board with the results,” and said the county does not let the public help at the transfer station either for liability reasons. The motion passed with Beerbower voting against (part 2, 52:37).

Temporary courtrooms at 108 W. Second

Beerbower presented a budget proposal for moving court operations to three temporary virtual courtrooms at 108 W. Second St. while the courthouse elevator is modernized, estimated at $28,540, mostly for computers and cameras, plus a reception counter, carpet tiles over the worn lobby carpet and cleaning (part 2, 57:58). Joe Allen asked whether IT equipment already stored in the courthouse could be used instead of buying new. On Tran’s motion, seconded by Joe Allen, the commission authorized Beerbower to issue the request for proposals and carry out the project on a not-to-exceed budget, with regular status updates and receipts. Tran stated the cap as $28,540.

Joe Allen reported that the county’s equipment auction through GovDeals is grouped into eight lots and should be listed within a week or two.

Purchasing policy, insurance and KORA fees held for next week

Milburn-Kee introduced a draft purchasing policy, modeled largely on the City of Fort Scott’s and citing state statutes, saying the county’s large-ticket purchases “have drawn a following and a little bit of attention because large vendors are not getting a chance at serving the county” (part 2, 1:14:11). The agenda packet includes a Sept. 9 letter from Travis Clinesmith of Murphy Tractor & Equipment Co. saying the company was never invited to compete for a Caterpillar motor grader financed at about $54,000 a year for eight years, an excavator at about $34,000 a year, or a proposed backhoe. Joe Allen offered a simpler policy requiring bids at purchase amounts of $10,000 or more. Beerbower also mentioned the idea of creating a policy manual for the county, which would include purchasing policies. Discussion was set for next week.

Milburn-Kee’s employee insurance proposal would set the county contribution at $1,100 a month for every employee who takes county coverage and pay $2 an hour in premium pay to employees who show they are covered elsewhere (part 2, 1:19:54). The written proposal says about 18 employees now receive up to $1,700 a month toward insurance while about 64 receive $925, and estimates the premium pay for about 35 employees at $145,600 a year. Milburn-Kee said that the county’s insurance agent is not in favor of paying employees who don’t take the insurance option, as they may be choosing not to insure at all. She didn’t think that would be the case. Joe Allen said he wanted to hear from employees; Beerbower asked for more time, and Milburn-Kee said Motley should see it as well. No action was taken.

The commission adopted Resolution 31-26 reassigning storage space: the clerk gives Pod H to the sheriff for evidence and moves to Pod B, formerly used by 911, and the old kitchen goes to Emergency Management. They also discussed moving a variety of IT equipment that is scattered in three different places in the courthouse to the server room so it can be secured and gone through at a future date. Allen asked about giving the Register of Deeds some of the space that will be freed up by moving the equipment. Milburn said that could be brought up at a future meeting after the move is accomplished.

County Clerk Anne Clarkson and Milburn-Kee presented a draft open-records resolution that would make each department responsible for its own records requests instead of routing them through the clerk; the board tabled it to update the fee schedule after Clarkson said copies should be 50 cents rather than 25 and that another county clerk she had spoken with charges $30 an hour for the work of answering a KORA request.

Housing pitch draws skepticism

A representative of KC Crown Inc. asked for a resolution of support for a Kansas Housing Investor Tax Credit application for up to 100 homes, built as duplexes, in four phases on 15 acres behind the K C Mart south of Fort Scott, saying the state requires a county resolution and the deadline is around Oct. 1 (part 2, 1:40:24). He said units would rent for about $800, the investment would be about $2.5 million for each of four phases (the written scope in the packet says $2.5 million “expected the first year”), and if no sewer connection is available the project would use a one-acre lagoon. Al Neese, speaking from the audience, said no sewer line had been approved by the city and urged “a hell of a lot more research” before the county commits. “There’s no free lunch out there,” he said, referring to past issues the county and city had both had with approving projects funded by “people we don’t know,” that left the government entities holding the bag. Tran said the tax-credit program is run by a nongovernmental organization. He and Beerbower asked that County Counselor Bob Johnson review the request, and Allen said he wanted Motley’s take on it as well; the board tabled it to next week. In closing comments Tran said that while they want good, affordable house in the county, he calculated that 100 buildings of 6,000 square feet each would nearly fill the acreage before roads or infrastructure. “Until I see some more information, this does not bode well for me,” he said.

“My sincere apologies”

In commission comments, Beerbower read a statement about “the heated discussions and debates” viewers have seen in county commission meetings. Healthy debate is essential, he said, but too often discussion “becomes centered on criticisms rather than suggestions.” He apologized “to this board and to the citizens of our community” for an exchange at last week’s meeting, saying it stemmed from a dispute more than a year old and “a public meeting is not the appropriate venue for such a confrontation” (part 2, 1:54:05). Tran thanked Anne Clarkson, appointed County Clerk Sept. 1, and Milburn-Kee for their work in getting the new clerk and the clerk’s office up to speed. Clarkson then thanks Jennifer Hawkins, County Treasurer for her help as well.

The commission approved accounts payable of $581,360.08 and $110,758.06 and the minutes of both Sept. 14 meetings. Next week’s agenda will include the budget, the purchasing policy, the insurance proposal, the KORA resolution, KC Crown, the appraiser MOU, transfer-station equipment and rates, and two emergency-management items.

The Bourbon County Commission voted 5-0 Monday night to keep the county’s property tax rate exactly where it is: 56.678 mills. Before it could do that, state law made it hold a public hearing and vote, on the record, to exceed what the law calls the revenue-neutral rate, the rate that would bring in the same dollars as last year.

Why would keeping a rate flat need a hearing about exceeding a rate? Because property values in the county went up, and a flat rate on higher values means the county will be raising the amount of taxes collected.

Start with the mill

Property tax is figured in mills. One mill is $1 of tax for every $1,000 of assessed value.

Kansas does not tax a home on what it would sell for. It taxes a home on 11.5% of that figure, which is called the assessed value. A $100,000 house has $11,500 of assessed value. To get the tax, multiply the assessed value by the mill rate and divide by 1,000. At the county’s rate of 56.678 mills, that is $11,500 times 56.678, divided by 1,000, or $651.80 a year going to the county.

That $651.80 is only the county’s line. The school district, the city and the township each set their own mill levy, and they are separate lines on the same bill.

The revenue-neutral rate is a calculation, not a decision

Every year the county clerk takes the property tax dollars the county collected last year and asks one question: with this year’s property values, what rate would bring in exactly the same dollars? That rate is the revenue-neutral rate. It is based on simple mathematics, and it moves every year because property values move.

For 2027 it came out to 54.661 mills. Last year the county’s property tax levy, the total it charged, was $7,858,151. For the 2027 levy, the county’s total assessed value (the sum total of the assessed value of all the property in the county) is $143,767,695. Multiply that by 54.661 and divide by 1,000 and you get $7,858,486, last year’s money within a few hundred dollars. The small gap is only rounding.

“Flat” does not mean taxes don’t go up

The commission adopted 56.678 mills, the same rate the county is levying this year. Budget consultant Matt Lawn of Baker Tilly called it “a flat mill levy”.

But the same rate on higher valuations raises taxes. Put 56.678 mills on the same $143,767,695 and you get $8,148,465, within a couple of hundred dollars of the $8,148,297 the 2027 budget asks for in property tax. The revenue-neutral rate is 54.661 mills. The commission kept 56.678. That 2.017-mill gap is worth about $290,000 more in county tax.

Where did the extra come from? The tax base grew. One mill is $1 per $1,000 of assessed value, so last year one mill in Bourbon County raised about $138,700. This year since valuations have gone up, it raises about $143,800. Higher values on property that was already there, with only a little new construction, added about $5.1 million of assessed value to the county’s tax base (the total assessed value of everything in the county). At the flat rate, that growth raises about $290,000 a year, roughly the gap between the two rates.

Your bill can go down while the county takes in more

Back in 2025 the county’s rate was 59.900 mills, and the county share on that $100,000 house was $688.85. At the 2027 rate of 56.678 mills the county will charge $651.80. The hypothetical $100,000 home that didn’t increase in value would have seen its county tax bill fall about $37 from 2025 to 2027.

At the same time, the county will collect about $290,000 more in 2027 than it would at the revenue-neutral rate. Both things are true, because the county is now taxing a higher total valuation of property. If that were because more homes and businesses had been built, more people would be sharing the load. In Bourbon County that is mostly not what happened. The county’s population has been flat to slightly down since 2020. The county appraiser’s market study for 2026 found home values rising 6.92% a year and commercial property 4.97% a year. Homes are nearly half the county’s tax base and businesses about a fifth, so those two trends together add about $5.8 million of assessed value, more than the whole $5.1 million increase, before counting anything newly built. The growth is mostly the same houses and businesses valued higher, not more of them. When that is what is happening, a flat rate means most county tax bills go up, because most valuations did.

While the rate is down 3.2 mills since 2025, property tax dollars the county levies are up about $170,000, from $7,977,466 to $8,148,297.

To be clear, your bill only falls if your own valuation did not go up. If your house followed the appraiser’s residential trend, a $100,000 house last year is valued at about $106,920 this year. Its assessed value is $12,296, and at the same 56.678 mills its county share goes from $651.80 to $696.90, up about $45 with no change in the rate. That is also $8 more than the $688.85 it paid in 2025, even though the rate is lower. Whether your own bill went up or down depends on the valuation notice you got this spring, not on the rate alone.

Why the law makes them hold a hearing

Since 2021, Kansas law (K.S.A. 79-2988) has required any city, county or school district to hold a public hearing and take a recorded roll-call vote if they intend to increase the total amount they are taking in taxes. It doesn’t matter whether the rate goes up or down. The hearing is triggered whenever the rate is above the revenue-neutral rate, the rate that would collect the same dollars as the year before. That applies even when the rate itself has not changed, which is Bourbon County’s situation this year.

The reason is the arithmetic above. Before that law, a county could adopt the same rate year after year while rising valuations raised the dollars it collected, with no separate vote on the increase. The rate was voted on. The extra money was not. The hearing and roll call require that extra money to be approved in public, with each commissioner’s vote recorded.

What happened Monday night

Commission Chairman Gregg Motley opened the hearing a few minutes into the Sept. 14 meeting, Lawn laid out the two rates, and Motley asked for public comment.

The only person to question the numbers was Deputy County Clerk Michael Hoyt, who asked why the published notice showed the county’s 2026 assessed valuation as zero. Lawn said “there was an error in the spreadsheet” and that he was correcting it. The figure was given in the room as $138,681,091.

Motley asked twice more for comment. “Going once, going twice,” he said. There was none.

He read the resolution, and the clerk called the roll. Joe Allen, David Beerbower, Mika Milburn-Kee, Motley and Samuel Tran all voted yes. The 2027 budget itself, about $20.1 million in total spending, was not adopted that night. Our story on the full meeting has the budget details, and the Sept. 11 work session on wages and transfer-station rates covers the spending behind those mills.

FORT SCOTT — The Bourbon County Commission voted unanimously Monday night to levy a property tax rate above the revenue-neutral rate, and in the same meeting committed $116,500 to write the county’s first comprehensive plan and zoning code, a document aimed squarely at wind farms, solar fields, battery storage and data centers.

The commission will levy a total of 56.678 mills for 2027. The revenue-neutral rate calculated by the county clerk — the rate that would raise the same amount of money from existing property as last year — is 54.661 mills. The difference is 2.017 mills, which budget consultant Matt Lawn of Baker Tilly put at roughly $294,000 (video, 5:01).

The levy is not an increase over the current year. It is the same 56.678 mills the county is levying now, and down from 59.900 mills in 2025. Kansas law requires a public hearing and a recorded vote whenever a county intends to levy above the revenue-neutral rate, even when the rate itself does not change, because rising property valuations would otherwise raise more money at the same rate. The county’s assessed valuation rose to $143,767,695 for 2027 from $138,681,091 the year before, a gain of about 3.7%. Applied at the unchanged rate, that growth alone brings in roughly $288,000 — very nearly the whole difference between the two rates.

Deputy County Clerk Michael Hoyt was the only person to question the numbers at the hearing. He asked why the published notice showed a total assessed valuation of zero for 2026 (video, 7:32). Lawn said there was an error in the spreadsheet and that he was correcting it; the figure was given in the room as $138,681,091. Hoyt also questioned an increase in the law enforcement fund, where Lawn acknowledged the published figures were wrong, and Chairman Gregg Motley told him that belonged in the budget discussion rather than the rate hearing.

After Motley read the resolution, the roll was called and all five commissioners voted yes: Joe Allen, David Beerbower, Mika Milburn-Kee, Motley and Samuel Tran (video, 13:03).

The 2027 budget itself was not adopted. Motley asked the commission whether it wanted to vote that night or hold the matter open, and the commission chose to hold it open (video, 20:33). Lawn said the county has until Oct. 1 and could adopt on Sept. 21st or 28th. Milburn-Kee said she wanted time with the comparison documents he had prepared, which the commission had received that evening.

Lawn walked the commission through the fund-by-fund changes behind the flat total: a reduction of about half a mill in the general fund, a 2.313-mill increase in the employee benefit fund covering a 5% rise in benefits and health insurance estimated at 18% to 20% higher, and decreases in law enforcement and road and bridge. Smaller movements included a 0.02-mill cut for noxious weeds, a 0.03-mill increase for emergency medical services and about a tenth of a mill more for elections. He had reduced the road and bridge levy by 1.134 mills, he said, because the county will not be able to transfer the full amount of federal disaster reimbursement money he had originally planned because part of it was already committed to pay other costs. Total law enforcement spending still rises, from $2.584 million to $2.851 million.

There were no comments or questions from the public on the budget in the meeting.

A comprehensive plan built around wind, solar and data centers

Commissioner Samuel Tran brought the comprehensive plan back to the table, saying that after Lawn’s budget work the money was there (video, 1:05:11). He then read a resolution approving a planning services agreement with Confluence Inc. for a comprehensive plan and zoning code regulations.

The agreement is for a total fee of $116,500, which includes reimbursable expenses of no more than $5,000. The county will pay $36,000 from the 2026 general fund and the remaining $80,500 from the 2027 general fund, subject to appropriation. The work is split into four phases, the largest being $68,000 for drafting the plan and the zoning code.

The resolution ties the work directly to Resolution 24-26, the temporary moratorium the commission adopted on large-scale power generation, crypto mining, data centers and waste disposal operations. The zoning code, the resolution says, is anticipated to address “utility scale wind and solar energy systems, battery energy storage systems, data centers” and other areas identified as the plan is developed.

Motley said he had understood the plan would be paid for by solar payments and asked whether that was any closer. Beerbower said that was why they had asked Lawn to find the money in the general fund instead. “That was a stretch asking the solar companies to put up money before it was… I mean, it doesn’t start until… It’s on a timeline,” he said (video, 1:12:35).

Motley also asked how the county would enforce the rules once they exist. Tran said enforcement cannot begin until there is zoning, and that the commission would get updates as the process ran so future commissioners could work out who enforces it. Milburn-Kee said she had brought the board numbers a few months ago on what enforcement had cost a neighboring county.

The resolution passed unanimously on a voice vote, and the commission then voted to authorize the chairman to sign the contract (video, 1:14:10).

Earlier in the meeting, resident Kyle Parks had used public comment to urge the commission to fund it. “I think this county commission is going to be remembered for a lot of things,” he said, “and I think one of them ought to be that you guys are the ones that passed the comprehensive plan and zoning.” (video, 24:24).

Appraiser hire authorized after a day of interviews

The commission spent the afternoon in a special meeting interviewing candidates for county appraiser, entirely in executive session. Monday night it took the action in the open, as Milburn-Kee had told the public that afternoon it would.

After a 15-minute closed session on non-elected personnel, the commission returned with action and voted to authorize Milburn-Kee to contact human resources and give authority to hire “appraiser A or B, considering their responses” (video, 45:05). The candidates were not named in open session.

Tran later said that the candidates the commission was looking were all familiar with zoning and came from counties that have it.

A second closed session, 10 minutes with county counselor Bob Johnson on pending litigation, returned with no action.

Burn ban lifted

Commissioner Joe Allen moved to lift the countywide burn ban, saying he had spoken with fire chiefs and emergency management and that the county had received upwards of five to six inches of rain over the past few days. It passed (video, 1:14:47).

A long argument over who gets to talk, and for how long

The sharpest part of the meeting came under an agenda item titled citizen involvement, sponsored by Milburn-Kee and brought by Kevin “Skitch” Allen, owner of Skitch’s Hauling & Excavation — “just a local trash hauler,” as he described himself — who was joined by Clayton Miller. It ran for roughly half an hour and picked up where the previous week’s public works work session left off.

Allen read a prepared statement for about 10 minutes. He traced the dispute to a request he and Miller made months ago to open the transfer station for half a day on minor holidays at double pay for the landfill employees, which he said never got an answer. Shortly afterward, he said, Public Works called Miller to collect his dumpster, and a week later called Allen to collect two portable toilets that had been at the site for years. “We felt as if it was either weird timing or possibly retaliation,” he said (video, 1:15:57).

He said one commissioner stopped taking his calls, and quoted him as having said publicly, “there’s 13,997 people that I will answer calls to, but you ain’t one of them.” He said that when the purchase of a new backhoe was put on hold pending a look at the finances, the same commissioner proposed substantial raises at the transfer station, including one plan under which a commercial driver with less than two years’ tenure would go from $17 to $30 an hour and out-earn the supervisor. Asked directly whether that was true, Allen said, the commissioner told him he would not answer.

Allen asked the commission to study a three-year profit-and-loss statement before raising dump fees at all, to hold local rates where they are and put any increase on out-of-county customers, who he said do not pay county property or sales tax. He also argued the county does not need a new backhoe: for under $20,000, he said, it could foam-fill the tires on the one it has for less than $5,000, repair the air conditioning in both machines and buy a $6,000 hot-water pressure washer. “Their equipment is filthy. They can’t see out of that stuff,” he said (video, 1:27:09).

He then turned to the three-minute limit on public comment. He said he had been reading fast to fit inside it the week before and had to be told to stop before he was finished. “It made me sick. I don’t like that,” he said, asking the commission to consider raising the limit to five or eight minutes (video, 1:31:42).

Beerbower answered by reading the county’s own meeting rules back. Resolution 21-26, he said, reserves a portion of each meeting for public comment limited to three minutes per speaker, and draws no distinction between a regular meeting, a work session, or a special meeting (video, 1:35:47).

Allen had called each commissioner individually before that work session last week to ask whether it would be an open back-and-forth, and said all three told him it would. Beerbower said that put them in a position of making a unilateral decision, and that nothing in any of the county’s meeting resolutions provides for open discussion at all. “So when they said that, they gave you a non-binding agreement that they’re not legally bound to do,” he said.

Beerbower also said he had been in error the week before when he called the work session his own. The floor had been yielded to him because it was his presentation, he said, but under Robert’s Rules of Order the chairman keeps control of the meeting.

It then turned personal. Beerbower said Allen had accused him of cronyism. Allen said he had never used the word. “You referred to me… basically said that I was giving a friend of mine that went on vacation with me, that I was giving him a $13 an hour raise,” Beerbower said, adding that the wage plan was a proposal for the board to work out and that he has no authority to give anyone a raise on his own (video, 1:40:00).

Beerbower said he had told Allen he did not owe him an apology until Allen apologized to him. He referrenced to an issue dating back to 2025 when Allen and others attended a commission meeting and protested separating the landfill from public works, which was part of Beerbower’s plan to make changes to both departments. The protest was based on information circulated in an email which Beerbower said he had nothing to do with. Beerbower said that as a county commissioner, there is no law obliging him to speak to anyone he doesn’t want to.

Allen said he had already made his apology. “I do not appreciate the accusations. I don’t think Clayton does either,” he said.

Johnson, the county counselor, interrupted to say the exchange was “probably more of a conversation for the two of you to have outside of a meeting. This is more personal.” Motley agreed it was not commission business. Beerbower’s answer was that “it became commission business when it happened in the commission” (video, 1:44:20).

“I’m just glad everybody at home got to see it,” said Kevin Allen as he left the table.

Also before the commission

Care to Share. Board members Cory Bryars and Teresa Davenport gave a semi-annual update. The all-volunteer group historically puts about $8,000 a month, or $100,000 a year, back into the community for people fighting cancer; that is up about 50% this year, Bryars said, and the group is now spending more than $12,000 a month. “We haven’t had to turn anyone down,” Davenport said, “and it’s because of the community support we get from Lynn, Bourbon and Crawford Counties that we’re able to help everybody that asks us. And I just want to thank the communities that we are serving that your money is being well spent and we just really appreciate it.”

Care to Share’s big fundraiser, the fifth annual Fort Fest, is Sept. 25 and 26 at Riverfront Park, and a benefit trap shoot follows Oct. 10.

Sheriff’s radio project. Under Sheriff Kevin Davidson appeared in place of the sheriff and patched in Darla Hout of Lexipol’s grant-finder team by phone. Hout said Lexipol has worked with the sheriff’s office for about 10 years and helped it secure nearly $500,000, but that this year has been unusually hard: the change of federal administration, last year’s government shutdown and a review of every federal grant program have left grants delayed or not opening at all. She said she needs a cost estimate for the full radio project, and that she and Sheriff Martin are still approaching grant programs. “It’s a hurry up and wait type of game,” she said. “You’re lucky to find two or three grants that are available and a good fit to fund any given project.”

Regional planning. Motley reported that two Community Development Block Grants are pending through the Southeast Kansas Regional Planning Commission for Bronson’s water treatment upgrade, one covering the bulk of the cost and one the matching funds, an investment he put at about $3 million in western Bourbon County. On 46 acres south of Fort Scott, he said, Equity Bank appears likely to prevail on its lien.

Fence viewing. Johnson advised that a fence-viewing request the commission had received was really a livestock and negligence dispute rather than a boundary question, and so falls outside what the statute is for. He noted he has represented counties for 29 years and Bourbon County is the only one that has ever brought him a fence viewing.

Human resources. Joe Allen brought a request for proposals for human resources services and the commission voted to issue it, after agreeing to leave the deadline at Oct. 7 to allow time for publication.

The commission approved the agenda as amended and minutes for Aug. 31, Sept. 2 and Sept. 9, had no accounts payable to approve, and postponed an item on a KC Crown Inc. project in Fort Scott for a week. It adjourned at about 7:25 p.m. Future agenda topics include a purchasing policy, an update from Joe Allen on the county auction, the county’s contribution toward employee insurance, a reorganization of the phone system so fewer calls land in the clerk’s office, and a Kansas Open Records Act policy.