Wichita water rates are about average for households using modest amounts of water. But households using a lot of water pay much less than average, leading us to wonder if Wichita could adjust its rates to encourage conservation and/or generate more revenue.
Data from a 2012 Black & Veatch survey of water and sewer rates in 50 large cities reveals an interesting characteristic of water rates.
Many cities have tiered water rates, where as a household uses more water, the marginal cost per gallon rises. This is the case in Wichita. Each household has its average winter consumption (AWC) as measured during the winter months. Presumably this is the water that is used for cooking, cleaning, flushing, bathing, and other indoor household needs. For Wichita city customers, for usage up to 110 percent of this value, or AWC, the rate is $1.77 per thousand gallons. For water used from 111 percent to 310 percent of AWC, the rate is $6.25 per thousand gallons. For use over this level, the rate is $9.13 per thousand gallons.
This means that water used inside the house — the presumed basis of AWC — has a low price in both winter and other seasons. But water used much above that value is more expensive. This is probably water used for swimming pools, irrigation of lawns, and other outside summer uses.
(The water usage is not the only cost that appears on Wichitans’ water bills. There is a minimum monthly charge and a charge for sewer service, and others.)
Water bills for different levels of usage. Average of 50 cities on top; Wichita on bottom. Click for larger version.Back to the Black & Veatch survey. For the 50 cities in the survey, considering only the water portion of bills, the average cost for using 3,750 gallons per month is $19. For using 15,000 gallons, the cost is $65. That’s a ratio of 3.4 to 1.
For Wichita, the survey reported costs of $18 and $36, for a ratio of 2.0 to 1.
These are two important numbers: 3.4 and 2.0. They mean that while Wichita water becomes marginally more expensive as more is used, the slope is not nearly as steep as the average. It means that households that use low amounts of water pay about average rates, but those using a lot of water pay rates much less than average.
Does this mean that if Wichita is serious about conservation of water, that it could ramp up summer water rates more in like with other cities? It looks that way.
And would this provide the revenue the city says it needs to develop a new water supply?
In this episode of WichitaLiberty.TV: Andrew Bernstein is a proponent of Ayn Rand’s Objectivism, an author, and a professor of philosophy. We talk about capitalism and other subjects. View below, or click here to view at YouTube. Episode 62, broadcast October 12, 2014.
A proposed downtown Wichita development deserves more scrutiny than it has received, as it provides a window into the city’s economic development practice that voters should peek through as they consider voting for the Wichita sales tax.
Next week a Wichita real estate developer will ask the Wichita City Council to approve a package of incentives for the redevelopment of Union Station in downtown Wichita. The proposal contains many facets that citizens need to understand. Additionally, the city’s handling of this matter is something that voters will want to keep in mind as they make their decision on the proposed Wichita sales tax in November.
Union Station LLC is asking for TIF, or tax increment financing. Most commonly, TIF works like this: A city borrows money (by issuing bonds) and gives the cash to a development. After the project is built and has a higher assessed value, the city uses the increased property tax payments (the “increment” in TIF) from the development to pay off the bonds. This obviously is risky for cities, because if the development doesn’t generate sufficient increment in tax payments to cover the bond payments, the city will have to make up the difference. This has happened in Wichita.
In recent years a new type of TIF has been created by statute, the “pay-as-you-go” TIF. Here, instead of issuing bonds and paying off the bonds with the incremental taxes, the city simply refunds the incremental taxes to the development. City documents describe: “The TIF statute also allows for projects to be financed on a pay-as-you-go basis, to reimburse the developer for eligible costs as TIF funds are received.”
This has less risk for cities, because if the hoped-for incrementally higher property taxes don’t materialize, the development doesn’t receive TIF proceeds. There are no bonds that must be paid. The developer just doesn’t receive what was projected. This is why the city claims that pay-as-you-go TIF has no risk to the city.
(Under pay-as-you-go TIF, since the city is essentially refunding nearly all property tax payments back to the development, we have to wonder why the city requires the taxes be paid at all. Also, there is the charade of spending TIF money only on “eligible” project costs. But the criteria for eligibility is broad, and we can be sure that developers will do all they can to make sure costs are characterized as eligible. But the eligibility criteria allows cities to appear to be fiscally prudent. Cities say they don’t allow TIF proceeds to be spent on just anything, but only on eligible costs.)
Here’s what the agenda packet says about this TIF: “Union Station LLC proposes to combine pay-as-you-go TIF with private financing to finance the proposed redevelopment project. The developer will finance through private sources all costs of the redevelopment project, including TIF-eligible project costs. Pay-as-you-go TIF revenue will be used to reimburse the developer on an annual basis with proof of expenditure of TIF-eligible redevelopment project costs.”
Buried in this paragraph is some financial slight-of-hand. Wichitans need to understand this so that they can be fully informed on this proposed transaction.
The problem lies is the meanings of the terms “to finance” and “to pay for.” Financing is the process of securing money to pay the costs of acquiring something. If financing is in the form of a loan, the economics of the transaction is that the borrower receives cash (assets go up) but also incurs an obligation to pay back the cash (liabilities go up by the same amount).
Then, when the borrower uses this cash to buy something — like a historic train station — one form of asset is exchanged for another. Cash is exchanged for title to the property.
It’s in the future, as the loan is repaid, that needs examination. The goal of real estate development is that the developer creates a project that generates more money coming in than loan payments going out. If this happens, it is a signal that the developer has met customer needs and has used capital in a way that makes everyone better off.
But there’s a confounding factor involved in the “pay for” part of the transaction that the city council will consider next week. The burden of some of the loan repayments will be born by the taxpayer. We don’t know for sure, but undoubtedly Union Station LLC will borrow money to make the project work. Proceeds from the TIF will be used to make at least some of the loan payments.
This is where the slight-of-hand comes in. The city says “The developer will finance through private sources …” That much is true. The city is not loaning any money. But some of the money used to pay back the private loans will come from TIF proceeds. So it is property tax payments being re-routed back to the developer that actually pays for part of the development: “Pay-as-you-go TIF revenue will be used to reimburse the developer on an annual basis …”
This is the heart of the transaction. It’s what citizens need to understand. Instead of Union Station LLC’s property taxes being used to pay the cost of government, nearly all of these taxes will pay off the owner’s loans.
The purchase of the property
Here’s what city documents state regarding the purchase of the property: “The $6,226,156 in equity is proposed to be in the form of $1,500,000 from the purchase of the property that will be contributed as collateral, $3,766,156 in monetized historic tax credits, and $960,000 in cash.”
It’s the “purchase of the property” that needs scrutiny. More from the city documents: “The developer would be compensated for the fair market value of the land where public access improvements would be located, not to exceed the $1,500,000 actual site acquisition cost. The Public Access Easement attachment illustrates that the portions of the site where a public access easement would be acquired is 274,059 square feet and that the average land acquisition cost of 10 comparable downtown properties is $6.71 per square foot, placing the fair market value of the land where the public access improvements would be located at $1,839,147.”
What’s happening is that part of the land area of the project is being called “public access improvements.” These are things like, according to city documents, “parking structure, pedestrian boardwalk, paving, utilities, and landscaping.” The city is proposing to pay the developer $1,500,000 for these areas.
If the council agrees to this, new avenues will have been opened for spending taxpayer funds. It places other commercial developers and landlords at a disadvantage. Consider, say, the recent Whole Foods Market that opened in Wichita. What Union Station LLC wants is like that developer asking to be reimbursed for the shrubs and grass that was planted, or the parking spaces that are provided. The public will, after all, view the sunlight reflected from the grass and breathe the oxygen generated by the shrubs. And, the public will park in the spaces. These “public access improvements” are part of what is necessary to provide an attractive and desirable development. It’s part of what businesses do to attract customers and earn profits. But the Union Station developer is asking that the city pay him for providing these things. If the council agrees to this, we can expect to see this template applied repeatedly in the future.
The missing tax credits
City documents state this regarding the sources of funds for the project: “Private to Public Investment Ratio — The proposed private capital investment is $36,578,000, and the proposed public capital investment is $17,321,000, resulting in a private to public capital investment ratio of 2.1 to 1.” But missing from this calculation is the contribution of taxpayers in the form of historic preservation tax credits. As reported above, the city reports the project will receive $3,766,156 in monetized historic tax credits.
(Tax credits are economically equivalent to a grant of cash from government. Commonly their value is used to boost the “private” equity contribution to the project. But since the tax credits come from government, we ought to call it the “peoples’ equity.”)
I inquired of city officials whether the historic preservation tax credits are federal, state, or both. The answer I received: “The Developer has not yet provided the City with details on the tax credits. However, staff analyzed the project to ascertain a ballpark estimate of how much it could generate in both state and federal tax credits and came up with a similar amount. We assume that $3,766,156 is the amount of net proceeds to be injected into the project from the sale of tax credits and that it is discounted from the face value of the credits.”
So it seems like the city is surmising things that may or may not be part of the developer’s plan.
False sales tax exemption applied
There’s another level of uncertainty in the city documents. In the analysis performed by Center for Economic Development and Business Research at Wichita State University, about $1.8 million in sales tax exemptions are included in the analysis. In my reading of the project documents, I didn’t see the project qualifying for sales tax exemptions. Upon inquiry to the city, I received this response: “The only incentive program available to Union Station that would provide a sales tax exemption is IRBs. The Developer did not request IRBs or a sales tax exemption. I would guess that CEDBR factored it into the cost-benefit analysis to be extra conservative.”
It appears there is a lack of communication between the city and CEDBR. More surmising. Exactly which incentives are available to be tapped by this project, and in what amount? Can we trust the analysis from CEDBR if it includes incentives that the project has not requested and is not eligible to receive?
Benefit-cost ratios
Benefit-cost ratios of Union Station LLC project for City of Wichita. Click for larger version.The city has a policy that economic development projects should have a benefit-cost ratio of 1.3 to 1 or greater. For this project, CEDBR reports these ratios:
City General Fund, 1.04
City Debt Service Fund, 1.15
Total City, 1.08
Sedgwick County, 1.06
State of Kansas, 1.66
School district, 7.19
For the city and county, the ratios are far below 1.3 to 1. There are many exceptions and loopholes in the incentive policy that allows the city to participate in projects with less than the 1.3 ratio.
The (un)certainty of city policies
For this project we see that city policy is being modified on the fly to meet the circumstances of a particular project. This is not necessarily bad. Entrepreneurship demands flexibility. But the city promises certainty in its standards, and city officials say Wichita has a transparent, open government. The Public-Private Partnership Evaluation Criteria for the redevelopment of downtown Wichita states “The business plan recommends public-private partnership criteria that are clear, predictable, and transparent.”
But as in the past, we find the city’s policies are anything but predictable and transparent. City documents state: “In the opinion of the evaluation team, the established criteria do not adequately address projects such as Union Station where the requested incentives do not involve City debt.” So we see the “clear, predictable, and transparent” policies discarded and reformulated. How are future developers supposed to know which policies can be waived or rewritten? How are citizens supposed to trust that city hall is looking out for their interests when policies are so fluid?
A recent spurt of growth of personal income in Kansas is welcome, considering the history of Kansas in this regard.
Kansas personal income grew in the quarter ending in June, with the Wichita Business Journal reporting “Kansas ranked 14th among states for second-quarter personal income growth.” The article also noted “According to data released Tuesday by the Bureau of Economic Analysis, personal income grew by 1.7 percent in the second quarter of 2014, faster than the national growth rate of 1.5 percent.”
Strong growth in personal income is good. But strong growth is not the norm for Kansas. The nearby chart shows cumulative growth of personal income in the states since 1990, with Kansas highlighted. Total growth for Kansas is 190 percent. For the entire county, it is 198 percent. For Plains states, 196 percent.
This is relevant to the decision Kansans will make in November when deciding their vote for governor. Progressive voices urge a return to the policies of Kathleen Sebelius and her successor (2003-2011), and Bill Graves (1995-2003). Sebelius, a Democrat, and Graves, a Republican, are seen by Progressives as paragons of “moderate,” “common-sense” leadership that is now — they say — missing.
An interactive visualization of personal income data is available for use here. You may select different time periods and any grouping of states. One of more states may be highlighted. There are similar charts in the visualization that show change in personal income year-over-year, and change from previous quarter.
Personal Income Growth in the States, Kansas highlighted. Click for larger version.
Those who call for a return to the economic policies of past Kansas gubernatorial administrations may not be aware of the performance of the Kansas economy during those times.
There are a variety of ways to measure the economic performance of states and countries. Job growth is one. Output, or gross domestic product, is another.
Real GDP by state, Kansas highlighted, through 2013. Click for larger version.
The nearby chart contains two views of GDP for Kansas and nearby states. Kansas is the dark line. The charts shows GDP for private industries only. (By using the interactive visualization, you can show other industries, time periods, and states.)
The top chart shows the percentage change in GDP from the previous year. The bottom chart shows the cumulative growth in GDP since 1997. Both charts illustrate that the performance of the Kansas economy is nothing to crow about, and it’s been that way for a long time.
You may use the visualization yourself. Click here to open it in a new window. There are other visualizations of data, including jobs creation by states, available here.
In this episode of WichitaLiberty.TV: Economist Dr. Art Hall of the Center for Applied Economics at The University of Kansas talks about issues relevant to the proposed Wichita sales tax, particularly water and economic development. View below, or click here to view on YouTube. Episode 60, broadcast September 28, 2014.
One of the most-often repeated themes heard during the Kansas Governor debate at the Kansas State Fair is that Kansas is a rural state, and that agriculture is vital to our state’s economy. It’s not just gubernatorial candidates that say this. It seems to be common knowledge.
Rural populations of the states. Click for larger version.There may be several ways to measure the “ruralness” of a state. One way is the percent of the state’s people that live in rural areas. The U.S. Census Bureau has these statistics. In the chart made from these statistics, Kansas is right in the middle of the states. 25.80 percent of Kansans live in rural areas.
As for the importance of agriculture to the Kansas economy, figures from the Bureau of Economic Analysis (part of the U.S. Department of Commerce) tell us that in 2013 agriculture contributed $6,914 million to the Kansas GDP. Total GDP in Kansas that year was $144,062 million, meaning that agriculture accounted for 4.8 percent of total Kansas economic production. That is a pretty high number; only six states have a higher percentage of GDP from agriculture.
Do these numbers mean anything? It’s common for Kansas politicians to emphasize — and perhaps exaggerate — whatever connections they may have to a family farm. It’s part of a nostalgic and romanticized view of Kansas, the Kansas of Home on the Range. We are the “Wheat State” and “Breadbasket of the World,” and “One Kansas farmer feeds 128 people (plus you).”
So while Kansas is in the middle in the ranking of percent of population living in rural areas, agriculture is a larger component of state income than all but a few states. Still, agriculture is less than five percent of Kansas income. Policymakers should keep this in mind, although politicians may not.
This Labor Day, as progressives promote their protection and advancement of workers, let’s become aware of the harm that labor unions have caused. George Reisman summarizes:
Far from being responsible for improvements in the standard of living of the average worker, labor unions operate in more or less total ignorance of what actually raises the average worker’s standard of living. In consequence of their ignorance, they are responsible for artificial inequalities in wage rates, for unemployment, and for holding down real wages and the average worker’s standard of living. All of these destructive, antisocial consequences derive from the fact that while individuals increase the money they earn through increasing production and the overall supply of goods and services, thereby reducing prices and raising real wages throughout the economic system, labor unions increase the money paid to their members by exactly the opposite means. They reduce the supply and productivity of labor and so reduce the supply and raise the prices of the goods and services their members help to produce, thereby reducing real wages throughout the economic system.
