Category: Wichita city government
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Jeff Longwell on the Wichita City Council
A timeline of events from the tenure of Jeff Longwell on the Wichita City Council.
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Making Wichita an inclusive and attractive community
There are things both easy and difficult Wichita could do to make the city inclusive and welcoming of all, especially the young and diverse.
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WichitaLiberty.TV: Wichita economic development, one more untold story
Readers of the Wichita Eagle might be excused for not understanding the economic realities of a proposed tax giveaway to a local development.
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Historic value, gone in a flash
Which buildings in Wichita have historic value can change at the whim of the council.
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Wichita city council candidate forum
At a meeting of the Sedgwick County Republican Party, Republican candidates for Wichita city council districts 4 and 5 spoke.
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Blubaugh, Mayor vote for licenses for undocumented workers to drive to their illegal jobs
The Wichita city council voted to recommend that the Kansas Legislature create drivers permits for undocumented workers so they could drive to their jobs.
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Wichita city hall falls short in taxpayer protection
An incentives agreement the Wichita city council passed on first reading is missing several items that city policy requires. How the council and city staff handle the second reading of this ordinance will let us know for whose interests city hall works: citizens, or cronies.
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Wichita drops taxpayer protection clause
To protect itself against self-defeating appeals of property valuation in tax increment financing districts, the City of Wichita once included a protective clause in developer agreements. But this consideration is not present in two proposed agreements.
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Wichita TIF projects: some background
Tax increment financing disrupts the usual flow of tax dollars, routing funds away from cash-strapped cities, counties, and schools back to the TIF-financed development. TIF creates distortions in the way cities develop, and researchers find that the use of TIF means lower economic growth.
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Wichita loan agreement subject to interpretation
In 2009 the City of Wichita entered into an ambiguous agreement to grant a forgivable loan, and then failed to follow its own agreement. Worse yet, there has been no improvement to similar contracts. Such agreements empower the city to grant favor at its discretion.
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Wichitaliberty.TV: Special taxes for artists
In this excerpt from WichitaLiberty.TV: Wichita government spending on economic development leads to imagined problems that require government intervention and more taxpayer contribution to resolve. The cycle of organic rebirth of cities is then replaced with bureaucratic management.
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A chance for Wichita to embrace transparency
Promises of transparency were made during the recent Wichita sales tax campaign. If the city cares about government transparency, the city should implement its promises, even though the tax did not pass.