Missouri lawmakers are once again taking a closer look at property tax changes.
State Sen. Joe Nicola—who represents part of Jackson County in the Kansas City area—said the real challenge is crafting a system that works for both urban and rural counties.
“In Jackson County, we don’t need personal property tax, but in other counties you have to have it. Like you’ve got to get some kind of tax revenue because every county is different,” said Nicola. “You have agriculture, counties, small counties, large counties, and we as lawmakers are stuck within that that all the counties have to be the same when we pass a law.”
Senate committee chair Sandy Crawford, R-Buffalo, said finding the right solution won’t be easy.
“We hear about how this is going to impact all the ambulance districts, the fire districts, the health departments, the whatever the, whatever,” said Crawford. “But we just need to keep in mind that we’re going to devastate some special districts if we do anything too drastic.”
Missouri senators heard a warning from Warren County Presiding Commissioner Joe Gildehaus—whose county lies just west of St. Louis in eastern Missouri. He said that shifting to sales tax might work for larger counties like his but could hurt smaller ones.
“Our county is one of the larger ones,” said Gildehaus. “We’re doing okay. We use a lot of sales tax. You go to the county in two hours from us and the biggest sales tax they have is at Casey’s. So that’s a big, big issue going on.”
Lawmakers must now decide what legislation to propose if any that would ease the property tax burden for Missouri residents—while still ensuring critical funding for schools, fire departments, and other essential local services.
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