Jackson County could solve its property tax mess by following Detroit’s smart solution | Opinion

Smarter taxation

As Missouri counties navigate the recently enacted S.B. 190 to deliver property tax relief for seniors, the state’s two largest cities — both of which are combating blight (Kansas City has 3,000 vacant lots, St. Louis 24,000) — and state and municipal leaders should monitor Detroit’s developing plan using a split-rate property tax.

Under the proposal championed by Mayor Mike Duggan, a lower tax rate would apply to buildings and a higher rate to land, thus increasing the cost on speculators sitting on underutilized properties. Detroit has the country’s highest property tax rates and 100,000 vacant lots.

Michigan H.B. 4966 would allow Detroiters to vote, as soon as 2024, on implementing separate rates on taxable properties. According to a 2022 study by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, by taxing land at five times the rate that buildings are taxed, Detroit would reduce tax bills by 17% for 96% of its homeowners.

From 1913 to 2001, Pittsburgh used a split-rate tax system before returning to a single-rate property tax. Nonetheless, Missouri should keep an eye on whether this novel method of taxation helps fellow Midwestern lawmakers reduce blight and provide tax relief to homeowners.

- Peter Gariepy, Richmond Heights, Missouri

Gun tragedies

In Maine, 18 people are shot to death. In Kansas City, a women is killed and a little girl is paralyzed, each by stray bullets. (Nov. 11, 1A, “Family mourns woman killed by stray bullet in Midtown KC”; Nov. 11, 2A, “11-year-old girl struck, paralyzed by stray bullet in KC”)

Where was “a good guy with a gun” to protect them? And to which “well-regulated militia” did the shooters belong?

- Ken Nelson, Kansas City

Not about race

I feel compelled to respond to a Nov. 12 letter to the editor that equated objections to rezoning of property in Prairie Village to the real estate redlining of the past. (16A) It repeated incorrect talking points that the root of this movement is racial. It is not. It is opposition to rezoning without public input and consent.

There are houses for rent in Prairie Village. We have no open spaces to construct new apartment complexes. The land is too expensive to build inexpensive dwellings to replace outdated post-World War II tract houses that have outdated electrical wiring, fragile plumbing, questionable foundations and no closets.

I live in a 1948 Prairie Village Cape Cod and welcome neighbors of any ethnicity.

- Ed Stine, Prairie Village

The Hawley show

Missouri Sen. Josh Hawley’s lack of respect toward Alejandro Mayorkas, U.S. secretary of Homeland Security during a Senate hearing on Oct. 31 was another grandstanding play to the extreme base of the Republican Party.

Hawley’s attack on Mayorkas centered on a single employee of DHS who had made antisemitic comments online. Somehow, Hawley wanted to suggest that those posts were emblematic of the entire department, and he pressed Mayorkas on it repeatedly.

The secretary responded by saying that the “odious” post is not emblematic of his department and that this particular person was under administrative review — but he could not comment further on the personnel matter. Mayorkas then informed Hawley that he is the son of a Holocaust survivor and that his mother lost all her family under the Nazis.

You’d think Hawley’s office would have researched Mayorkas’ past before the senator’s despicable, insensitive and self-serving display.

But we have seen Hawley’s political pageantry before, as we witnessed his raised fist on Jan. 6, 2021, to let the MAGA insurrectionists know he was with them all the way.

- Steve Weneck, Kansas City

GOP agenda

The Republican Party has a long-term plan to cut Social Security and Medicare. When Donald Trump was president, the national debt increased by almost $8 trillion because of his budget priorities and the big tax cut to the wealthy and corporations he and the Republicans passed. The newsletters I receive from Sen. Roger Marshall and Reps. Ron Estes, Jake LaTurner and Tracey Mann blame the national deficit on the Biden administration and accept no blame for their part in it.

After Mike Johnson was elected speaker of the House, one of the first things Republicans did was to pass a plan to aid Israel and cut the budget of the IRS. Defunding the IRS would ensure that those with the most means find ways to get bigger tax breaks. With the wealthy and big corporations not paying their fair share, the deficit would increase.

Next step in the plan is to have Republicans complain louder about the big deficit (blaming Biden’s administration) and say that Medicare and Social Security need to be cut. In reality, it is when the wealthy and big corporations pay less in taxes that the deficit goes up.

Beware: Do not vote for Republicans who want to give the wealthy and corporations bigger tax cuts. Save Social Security and Medicare.

- Karen Bradfield, Lenexa