BY KEITH LIPPOLDT
klippoldt@gbtribune.com
County Treasurer Jim Jordan addressed the Barton County Commissioners Tuesday morning asking for assistance from them with the state legislators to help alleviate a revenue shortcoming in the Motor Vehicle Department.
For several years, according to the commission meeting agenda, the Kansas County Treasurers Association has sponsored a legislative bill that would increase fees dedicated to the Counties for the provision of motor vehicle services on behalf of the state. The way it is today, these monies that are collected do not even cover operational costs.
“We have not had an increase in the motor vehicle fee since 2008,” Jordan said. “This year, motor vehicle ended up approximately $50,000 in the hole. Next year, I’m projecting about $64,000 in the hole. We’re going back to the legislators to try to get that fee increased. This year, we’re going to try to do a $5 title fee increase and a $5 registration fee increase. That’ll help, but it’s not going to cure the whole gap.
“We’re going to present this in February and we need your help help with the legislators to get them to approve this.”
Commissioner Shawn Hutchinson asked Jordan, “Do you add an additional fee when someone gets a new tag? Explain the process to me.”
“The state mandated a $2.50 cent facility fee,” Jordan said. “If we have one facility, it’s $2.50. If we have two facilities, we charge up to $5. That is to help offset that cost. Legislators would not allow us to raise money because a lot of the treasurers don’t apply that fee. Well, Barton County, we applied that fee. That is still to help offset that cost of the motor vehicle. And it’s still not enough.”
Hutchinson replied that he has seen where Jordan is “getting blasted” over charging these fees.
“Here’s the thing, if we can get this to raise, that $2.50 cent fee will go away,” Jordan said. “If we don’t get this to raise, you guys are going to have to raise my budget, or I’m going to have to come to you and get more money. So all the taxpayers are going to pay more money. Landowners are the ones that are paying for it, right? So if they don’t have vehicles in Barton County, they’re going to pay for it. And you know how it is - once you raise taxes, they don’t go back down.
“So I tried to use that ($2.50 fee) to help offset that. It’s the legislators just have blinders on.”
Hutchinson said it was important to get the message out there explaining exactly why Jordan is doing what he is doing, and it still doesn’t cover the cost.
“I just think it’s important that, if nothing else, we come away today with the public understanding why you charge $2.50,” Hutchinson said. “$50,000 in the red, even charging $2.50. That $2.50 only gets charged to the people that are using the service.”
Jordan explained that only the people that come into the office are charged the fee. Several people have decided to mail them in and save the $2.50 fee. Jordan said there’s still a fee, but now it’s going to Topeka. Barton County now has the expenses of stamps, envelopes and labor to forward it on. He said it costs them more for these than for the ones who actually come into the office.
“If we don’t do anything, nothing changes,” Hutchinson asked. “All the taxpayers of Barton county chip in for somebody that has a lot of vehicles, instead of them paying the difference? Again, I just think it’s important that, if nothing else, we come away today with the public understanding why you charge $2.50.”
Jordan replied, “I can’t take another $60,000 hit. And that will happen in 2026 if this bill does not go through. The other option we can do is reduce employees. That would cut the cost. But then again, now you’ll stand in line longer, and now we reduce the services. It’s a double edged sword.”
Here is a brief look at what the Barton County Commissioners did Tuesday morning:
• Approved the purchase from Champ Software in the amount of $31,750 for 21 named licenses for Nightingale Notes Electronic Health Records for the Health Department. The program was originally put into use by the Health Department in 2017, and the results are more than favorable.
“This has been really good. It has saved staff time. We use it for documentation, data and reports,” said Health Director Karen Winkelman. “We pull a lot of data off of it for our grants and billing. We also use it to scan documents. We can generate reminders for different appointments or different things. Also, last year, when I came to you for the renewal, I mentioned about interfacing with some of the KDHE programs. They have a lot of standalone programs that we are required to use because of the grants.”
Barton County, along with Montgomery County, were selected last year to be the pilot counties to integrate with the Kansas Health and Environment Lab. The program worked so well they are now offering it to all counties in the state.
A motion was made by Hutchinson and seconded by Commissioner Donna Zimmerman. The motion carried 4-0. Commissioner Barb Esfeld was not present.
• Approved Resolution 2025-05: 2025 Tax Sale, authorizing County Treasurer Jim Jordan to sell certain tracts of real estate for back taxes. This money will then be distributed to various taxing entities across the county.
Jordan reported the number of parcels, nearly 100, is fairly comparable to the number from two years ago.
“There’s about 94 parcels this year, right now,” he said. “There’ll be some that will come in and redeem and set up a payment plans. It will probably drop down to around 60.”
Commissioner Duane Reif made the motion to authorize the Tax Sale and it was seconded by Hutchinson. The motion carried 4-0.
• Related to the 2025 Tax Sale, the commissioners accepted the bid from Pam Curtis with First American Title Company to carry out the abstracting services for the Tax Sale. First American Title will provide the needed services for $80 per parcel.
“We proposed to keep our rate at $80 per certificate,” Curtis said. “Each certificate will show the ownership and any lien holders that will need to be served in the process to redeem the property, if needed. We’ve been doing this now for several years with Jim’s office (County Treasurer). And $80 is what we did the last time.”
Zimmerman made the motion to accept the $80 bid price. Reif made the second and the motion passed 4-0.
The next Commission meeting will be Tuesday, January 28 at 9 a.m. at the Courthouse.
