The head of an interim Missouri House committee aimed at property tax reform says it's highly unlikely the panel would finish its work between now and a potential special session in September.
Members of the special committee met for the first time on Wednesday. They will hold five more meetings across the state, including one on Aug. 20 in St. Louis.
Committee Chair Tim Taylor, R-Bunceton, said the goal is to gather testimony from residents, local officials and stakeholders across Missouri.
"The meetings that we have set up in the goal of finding common sense reforms and solutions that will protect homeowners, promote economic stability and ensure accountability," Taylor said.
House Speaker Jon Patterson, R-Lee's Summit, established the committee in June. Patterson has expressed interest in holding a special session on property taxes around the same time as the September veto session.
However, when asked by committee member Kemp Strickler, D-Lee's Summit, about that potential deadline, Taylor said the committee should not rush its work.
"We need to do things that are good for the state and not rush something that's going to cause irreversible harm," Taylor said.
In June, the legislature passed some property tax changes, but they didn't apply statewide.
The 20 committee members held a variety of opinions on property taxes.
Rep. Ben Keathley, R-Chesterfield, said this is an issue the legislature needs to address.
"There's tons of examples around all over the state of Missouri, families are properly asking that question, 'Who owns their house?' when they have these rising tax bills year after year in every assessment," Keathley said.
Rep. Kathy Steinhoff, D-Columbia, said she wants to be protective of taxing districts because "these entities are what make our communities, what our communities are."
"As I look, to think about protecting those taxing entities and the will of the voters, because these levies were voted on by the voters in our community. I also very much understand that the system that we have in place has some cracks, and that maybe not everyone is being treated fairly in this process," Steinhoff said.
The committee heard testimony for roughly four hours, with multiple people warning about being too broad with any potential changes to property taxes.
Matt Bowen, director of the Missouri Ambulance Association, said addressing property taxes will require a "scalpel approach" instead of a broader strategy.
"Our lower-population counties, if we arbitrarily and randomly assign caps, these counties are going to suffer drastically, specifically when it comes to those essential services like our fire protection districts and our schools and our ambulance districts and our roads and bridges," Bowen said.
Robin Westphal, executive director of the Daniel Boone Regional Library in Columbia and a former state librarian, said libraries and other special taxing districts want to work with the committee to find a solution.
"We respectfully urge you to preserve a path for sustainable local funding that ensures library systems remain strong and accessible across all corners of Missouri," Westphal said.
The next meeting of the committee will be on July 30 in Lebanon.
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