The alleged difference in the constitutional assessment limit between the House and the Senate was that the Senate favored a fixed rate (as do the vast majority of voters), while the House favored a rolling average of assessed values. I say ‘alleged’ because it didn’t appear that the House Tax Committee and others wanted a meaningful assessment limit to protect taxpayers, and that was borne out on the last day of the session.
Rep. Ken Corbet (R-Shawnee Co.) tried to bring SCR 1616 up for debate, which limited the increase in assessed values to 3%. His motion was immediately attacked by Rep. Tom Sawyer (D-Sedgwick Co.).
“This is the valuation cap. Valuation caps are not property tax relief.”
Then Rep. Adam Smith (R-Wallace Co.) asked members to vote the motion down, saying the House had already voted against the 3% assessment limit. He also accused the Senate of disrespecting the House.
“How many times has the Senate voted on a rolling average? Never. If the Senate wants a constitutional amendment to address property values, we sent them a good resolution.”
After explaining how the Senate could resurrect the House rolling average, he said,
“I’m not sure why we have to yet again vote on their proposition when they haven’t voted on ours once. I’m tired of getting this shoved down our throats.”
Several Senators told me the Senate didn’t take it up because the votes weren’t there for a rolling average. Partly, because it only spreads the pain over a few years; it doesn’t limit the pain of a double-digit valuation increase, as does a 3% assessment limit. Further, a property owner who consistently receives a 12% valuation increase will see their taxable assessed value rise by 12% under once the House rolling-average concept is fully implemented, whereas the increase would be capped at 3% per year under the Senate plan.
Fifteen years into this scenario, the owner of a home valued at $300,000 today would pay $21,739 in property taxes at 150 mills under the rolling-average, versus just $8,062 with a 3% fixed limit.[i] The homeowner pays $28,326 without either bill, but the rolling average is much more favorable to local government, which seems why influential members of the House Tax Committee pushed it.
The House Tax Committee was given data demonstrating the superior savings taxpayers get with a 3% fixed assessment limit, but apparently felt that wasn’t enough to offset what Committee Chair Adam Smith believed were “disparity problems” associated with a fixed cap.
However, the disparities he referenced that occur in other states were largely eliminated by the transferability clause in the Senate fixed 3% cap. Under SCR 1616, the taxable assessed value of a property remains with it when sold, rather than being taxed at the sale price, as do other states. With the exception of newly built homes, the transferability clause avoids material differences in the taxable assessed value of similar properties in the same neighborhood.
So in the view of rolling-average supporters, it’s better to have most of the more than one million owners of existing homes pay much higher property taxes than to have the roughly 5,000 annual buyers of newly constructed homes have more of a disparity relative to existing homes.
Fixed-cap opponents claimed the disparity would discourage new home construction, but they produced no evidence that that occurred in states with assessment limits. To the contrary, we found evidence that new home construction increased in Oklahoma and Arkansas immediately following the implementation of assessment limits.
So, those pushing the rolling average effectively told their constituents “tough noogies.”
Many Senators also said they wouldn’t vote on the rolling average because it’s not what voters want, referencing our public opinion survey. 75% of voters want an assessment limit, and of those, only 17% want it to be a rolling average, while 66% want a low fixed-rate limit.
Rep. Sean Tarwater (R-Johnson Co.) highlighted a common perspective that shouldn’t have a place in substantive policymaking.
“I vote on policy when I’m in this room. I don’t care who wrote it. I don’t (care) whether the other chamber voted on our bill or not. I’m not going to take my ball and go home because we didn’t get a vote (on our bill).”
Meaning some folks consider who or which chamber initiated legislation rather than evaluating it on the merits.
Corbet’s motion failed, receiving only 68 of the 84 votes needed.
Another failed, last-ditch attempt to protect taxpayers with a generic assessment limit
The Senate later passed and sent HCR 5008 over to the House just before going home for the year. It contained the rolling average methodology the House wanted, but it “would also provide the legislature the authority to establish valuation limits for any classes or subclasses of property.”
Rep. Smith introduced the measure, starting by thanking the Senate.
“I would like to commend the Senate. They have passed the rolling average. This constitutional amendment allows for the determination of value based on the lesser of fair market value or the average fair market value as defined by law. (The) problem is the first sentence says the Legislature may provide for valuation limits for any classes or subclasses of property. So they passed the rolling average, but they also passed the 3% cap.”
The bill does not, however, include a 3% cap; it just allows for future legislatures to have the constitutional authority to amend property tax policy down the road.
Smith made a motion to concur with the Senate bill (although he later voted against it). Sawyer then stepped up to ask Smith a question.
“So essentially, it’s the same thing we keep voting down.”
Smith replied, “Not exactly, but yeah.”
Sawyer said,” Valuation caps are a bad idea. Artificial caps are not good. They create inequities. They don’t provide property tax relief. Some people’s taxes will go down, some will go up, because when you lower values, the mill levies go up. So this will guarantee mill levies go up. This will guarantee car taxes go up because…car taxes are based on the average county mill levy.”
There is a lot to unpack here, starting with the fact that the House rolling average IS a form of an assessment limit. It provides nowhere near the protection of a fixed-rate limit, but it produces a slightly lower taxable assessed value. You can’t honestly push a rolling-average methodology and also say assessment limits are bad.
It’s true that mill rates would likely increase if taxable values were lower, but that’s not just with the fixed-rate cap; it’s also true of the rolling average Sawyer and others were pushing. Further, the levy increase will be mitigated by the mill rate limit that the House had already passed (which Sawyer also opposed). A mill rate limit forces local elected officials to Bee [more] Honest with their tax hikes and not hide behind valuation games.
Car taxes would increase slightly if mill rates rose more than they otherwise would, but any increase would be more than offset by savings on homes. We conservatively estimate that a 3% cap would save homeowners $3 billion over the first ten years. Vehicle taxes only generate about $32 million, and it’s a pretty safe bet that Kansans would gladly pay a small increase on their vehicle tax to save $3 billion on their residential taxes. Those pushing the vehicle tax hysteria know that, but that’s politics.
It’s important to view legislation as a whole. Rarely are bills “all good” or “all bad.” Don’t violate principle, but don’t use the potential for an increase in property with an assessed value of $226 million to reject material savings on residential and commercial property with more than $44 billion in assessed value.
The ‘some would pay more, and others would pay less’ is another deception. Absent rolling back valuations by several years (which was in the Senate legislation, virtually everyone pays more each year because values still increase, but at a lower rate under either proposal. The sleight of hand goes like this: they say taxes go down if a homeowner benefits from the valuation limit, even though the homeowner still pays more than the year before.
HCR 5008 needed 84 votes to pass, but only 59 people, all Republicans, voted for it, and opposition came from the 28 Republicans and 34 Democrats in the adjacent table.
The effect of their opposition to valuation cap protection will cause many homeowners whose valuations rise more than 3% to pay more property tax in the years to come.
[i] Assumes the 3% limit goes into effect in 2027, and a six-year rolling average is phased in according to HB 2394 as introduced in 2025.
