Overland Park could soon join the ranks of other Johnson County cities that offer some kind of property tax rebate for lower-income residents.
The Overland Park City Council Finance, Administration and Economic Development Committee on Wednesday voted 4-2 to recommend the creation of a rebate pilot program for 2025. Committee Chair Holly Grummert and Councilmember Jeff Cox cast the no votes.
The vote suggests to the rest of the city council that the city of Overland Park budget $200,000 to start up a first-come-first-served property tax rebate pilot program.
Other JoCo cities have property tax rebates
Overland Park has lowest property tax rate in Johnson County
- Overland Park’s property tax rate, at 14.573 mills, is lower than any other Johnson County city.
- Additionally, the average home value is about $470,000.
- That means the average home in Overland Park owed $787.32 in property taxes to the city specifically this year.
- However, the tax bill each property owner receives annually includes rates set by other jurisdictions, including Johnson County and the school district in which they reside.
Committee recommended some rebate parameters
- On Wednesday, the committee stopped short of voting on specific final eligibility criteria for the proposed rebate pilot program.
- However, committee members had a fairly lengthy discussion about what those parameters for entry might look like.
- The general — though not complete — consensus was to cap any rebate at 75% of someone’s total city property tax bill.
- Most committee members also favored limiting it to owner-occupied residences that are current on their property taxes.
- They would also like to see a limit on the program to only include people who are very low income, a standard set by the U.S. Housing and Urban Development Department.
- There was some back and forth about also making only older adults and disabled veterans eligible, but the discussion lacked consensus on that.
Committee broadly supported property tax rebate idea
The majority of the committee on Wednesday was in favor of the property tax rebate proposal.
Councilmember Melissa Cheatham, who was one of the primary proponents of property tax relief in 2023, said she thinks the rebate program would give residents who really need it more targeted relief from property taxes than cutting mills from the tax rate would.
Plus, she worried that blanket cuts to the property tax rate could have big implications for the health of the city’s finances and impact its ability to provide the services residents expect.
Cox was the only committee member truly opposed to the pilot.
In addition to questioning how such a program could be administered fairly, he said he would have preferred to see the city cut the mill levy rate instead of trying to individually address the burden some taxpayers feel with an ultimately small-scale rebate program.
“When we get into these ‘The government is going to solve the world’s problems,’ we get into these endless amounts of complications about what’s just, what’s fair, whatever,” he said. “I just think that these things get endlessly complicated when you try to actually do them.”
Grummert ultimately supported the idea of the rebate pilot, but she voted against the proposal because it lacked a set of defined parameters.
Next steps:
- The proposal to budget $200,000 for the 2025 city property tax rebate pilot goes to the Overland Park City Council next.
- Down the line, the city council will approve a budget for 2025 and set the property tax rate for that calendar year as well.
Looking back: Overland Park in early stages of discussing 2 tax rebate ideas
