The Platte County Commission reduced property taxes at a special administrative session held last Tuesday.
Commissioners voted unanimously to reduce the county’s property tax levy from six cents per $100 assessed valuation to just one cent.
Presiding Commissioner Scott Fricker explained the move, which the commission had been mulling for some time.
“For the last couple of years, the county has been generating excess sales tax revenues, so instead of spending it and growing the government, we’ve decided to give some of it back to Platte County property owners with this property tax reduction,” Fricker said. “We would reduce the levy to zero, but that would require voter approval in the future if the levy needed to be raised for any reason.”
This action will apply to 2025 and 2026 property taxes. The maximum tax ceiling approved by voters for Platte County is 35 cents.
Second District Commissioner Joe Vanover said he studied Fricker’s proposal to reduce the general levy and that he “wholeheartedly” agreed with the reduction.
“Each school district, city and governmental body in Missouri sets its own tax rate,” Vanover said. “The Platte County government property tax rate has gone up and down several times over the years. In 2000, the tax rate was 12 cents. Later it was lowered to one cent. In recent years, the rate has been six cents. The rationale for setting the rate at six cents was that five cents were needed to pay for major upgrades to the law enforcement communications systems. Each cent of property tax means approximately $300,000 in tax revenue. Platte County paid our final lease payment for the communications equipment last year.”
Over the past several weeks, Platte County Administrator Wes Minder submitted nine grant applications to the Mid-America Regional Council (MARC) for various parks and road projects. MARC is the regional agency that allocates State and Federal grant funds to counties and municipalities, mostly for road projects, but also for other transportation-related projects.
During his career Minder has been successful in getting many grants from MARC and was instrumental in working with Platte City to obtain federal planning funds to study parking, traffic, and sidewalk improvements in downtown Platte City. According to Minder,
“Most of our applications that submitted to MARC are to leverage our parks and recreation sales taxes using federal funds specified for bike and pedestrian trail projects, but also includes one road project serving Kansas City, Northmoor and Riverside,” Minder said. “These grants are an important way for us to leverage County funds and stretch our sales taxes to get more projects done and keep federal funds in Platte County.”
To voice support for these projects, residents may visit https://tinyurl.com/6fff95fy and scroll down to Platte County. Comments are due by Oct. 4.
The Platte County Parks Department held a ribbon cutting ceremony on Friday, Sept. 27 to celebrate the opening of a new bike/pedestrian trail connection adjacent to the Angeline Washington Elementary School, linking Brush Creek Trail to Southern Platte Pass Trail and beyond. The project is a partnership between Platte County Parks, who funded the initiative; Park Hill School District, who managed the construction of the new Angeline Washington Elementary; and Parkville Parks, who will maintain the trail.