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AP: Senate committee approves fix to fuel tax mistakes
Published 3/10/2010 in Local News
TOPEKA (AP) — An amendment offered in the Senate budget committee Tuesday would restore $5.3 million in fuel tax revenue denied Shawnee County due to a series of computer errors by officials in the state revenue department and the state treasurer's office.
The Senate Ways and Means Committee, including two Topeka senators, voted in favor of a measure that would correct the problem by modifying fuel tax appropriations to all 105 counties during the next five years. Counties receiving more than their share of this tax revenue in the past would see a corresponding decrease in future allocations until shorted counties were made whole.
"This is the long-awaited correction," said Sen. Ty Masterson, an Andover Republican who proposed the amendment.
Democratic Sen. Laura Kelly, of Topeka, said phasing in the fix would minimize financial disruption in the 100 Kansas counties paid too much in the past. Five counties — Shawnee, Barton, Butler, Douglas and Leavenworth — were shorted a total of $11.1 million during the past decade.
"It's about as fair a way it can be done," Kelly said.
Sen. Vicki Schmidt, R-Topeka, said the amendment wouldn't cost taxpayers money because the solution depended on reallocation of existing revenue.
"I'm thrilled," she said. "It's a much better option than taking it out of state general funds."
Other than Shawnee County, big winners if the committee's $11.1 million remedy is passed by the full Senate, House and signed by Gov. Mark Parkinson would be Douglas County, owed $2.5 million; Butler County, shorted $1.9 million; Leavenworth County, missing $1.1 million; and Barton County, shorted $159,000.
Vic Miller, a Shawnee County commissioner, said movement of the amendment in the Senate committee was welcome news.
"I think it's very, very reasonable," he said. "I'm grateful."
Now-corrected computer programming errors and mistakes in calculating reimbursements poured millions of dollars in extra payments to counties across the state. For example, Johnson and Sedgwick counties both received $2.3 million more than they should have in the past.
The fuel tax funding is forwarded to counties and shared with cities and townships for the purpose of fixing roads.
The Kansas Department of Revenue helped skew the calculations by providing incorrect data about vehicle registrations to the treasurer's office. At the same time, a software programming error introduced at the treasurer's office went undetected for years.
State audits from 2000 through 2007 hadn't uncovered the problem, but in 2008 then-Treasurer Lynn Jenkins notified Republican legislative leaders she had learned problems existed in allocation of tax revenue on fuel. Jenkins, a Republican, didn't share that information with Democratic leaders in the House and Senate. The issue wasn't made public until Jenkins was campaigning for the U.S. House against Democratic Rep. Nancy Boyda.
The 2009 Legislature attempted to correct three years of fuel tax accounting miscues by authorizing payment of $6.6 million to 20 counties thought to have been shorted by the state. Overpaid counties weren't required to repay funding in that bill. In that budget bill, Shawnee County captured $3.3 million.
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