Committee hears amendments to property tax freeze bill that would raise income and value thresholds

A Senate committee heard testimony on proposed changes to the state’s property tax freeze rebate program that would exclude Social Security from household income, raise the program’s household income cap to $80,000 and increase the base-year homestead appraised-value cap to $595,000.

The bill sponsor, identified in committee as Amelia, said the measure would amend “79 45 0 8 a” to exclude all payments under the Federal Social Security Act from the definition of household income, raise the household income upper limit to $80,000 and raise the appraised-value cap for a claimant’s homestead base year to $595,000. Amelia said the bill would “add a new annual adjustment to the upper limit appraised value threshold for the base years commencing after 2025,” and that the income and appraised-value amendments would apply beginning with tax year 2025.

The changes would continue an existing cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for the household income ceiling, while adding an annual adjustment tied to the statewide valuation of existing residential real property for the preceding 10 years to update the homestead appraised-value limit after 2025. Amelia described the program as a “property tax freeze program that is a rebate program,” explaining that the rebate equals the difference between the claimant year’s tax and the claimant’s base year tax.

Committee members asked how eligibility and the base year operate. Kathleen Smith with the Department of Revenue told the committee: “Once you’re in the program, you are in the program.” Smith explained that a claimant must meet age or disability requirements and the base-year appraisal threshold at the time the base year is established; for example, if a person turned 65 in 2020, “your base year is 2021,” she said.

Senators probed scenarios such as a claimant earning under the new income cap in a later year after previously not qualifying, and the committee clarified that a base year is established only when a claimant meets the statutory requirements, and that eligibility for a refund in any later year still requires meeting the income threshold for that claim year.

Military and veterans’ concerns were raised in written and oral testimony. Mike Kelly of the Military Officers Association of America, Kansas Council of Chapters, urged that additional Veterans Administration payments be excluded from household income calculations. Kelly described distinctions within Title 38 federal VA payments and asked the committee to consider excluding payments made under 38 C.F.R. sections 3.3 (veteran’s pension), 3.4 (disability compensation) and 3.5 (dependency and indemnity compensation) from household income.

Senators and the sponsor flagged administrative follow-up: the bill’s fiscal impact will be requested from staff, and the sponsor said fiscal notes would be sought to quantify the effect of the proposed thresholds.

The committee closed the hearing on the measure; no final committee vote on the bill was recorded in the transcript.

The discussion included written testimony from Glenda Du Bois, Mike Kelly, Penny Lowell and Mark Toome, all entered into the record.