Ballot error voids township tax levy

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The small stuff counts — especially when it comes to ballot language.

That’s a lesson the Nodaway County Commission and Independence Township officials learned this week after the office of Missouri State Auditor Nicole Galloway essentially invalidated voter approval last April of a road maintenance tax levy.

Independence Township is one of 15 political subdivisions in Nodaway County set up primarily to collect taxes used to gravel rural roads. Roughly rectangular, Independence Township takes up the northeast corner of the county and includes the town of Parnell.

How the ballot gaffe happened is still a mystery, South District Commissioner Robert Stiens said Wednesday. But what happened is fairly simple.

A decimal point that shouldn’t have been there means voters mistakenly approved a tax levy set at about a third of a cent per $100 of assessed valuation instead of 35 cents per $100.

Here’s how the ballot question read: “Shall Independence Township issue its general obligation .35-cent road levy for the purpose of road and bridge maintenance, machinery repair and cost?”

That’s “.35-cent,” not 35 cents, meaning, according to what Galloway staffer Jill Wilson told the commission on Aug. 7, that the township can only collect 35/100 of a penny for each $100 of assessed value assigned to real and personal property.

The commission asked the auditor’s office to reconsider, but was told Wednesday that wasn’t going to happen.

Independence Township has an assessed valuation of a little more than $5.5 million, and Stiens said the error means levy revenues due starting in November will total only $193, rather than the nearly $20,000 intended when the ballot question was formulated.

What’s more, it’s too late to hold another election.

Townships are required to call public hearings and officially set their levies by September before taxpayers start mailing in checks at the end of the year. That means Nov. 7, the next election date allowed under state law, comes too late in terms of collecting the tax at its intended revenue level.

Stiens said he is recommending that the township simply wait until the next municipal election on April 3, 2018, before going back to the voters. In addition to producing no immediate revenue increase, a special November vote would cost around $2,000 to set up, while the expense of participating in the regular April vote will be spread out among the county’s other taxing entities.

And Independence Township will still have some money with which to purchase road gravel next spring. Like Nodaway’s other townships, the district has a 50-cent per $100 of assessed valuation levy that stays on the books permanently.

But with gravel prices rising steadily, and the township’s budget slender in the best of circumstances, it’s a bitter pill to swallow.

After learning about the ballot error, Stiens said the commission contacted state Rep. Allen Andrews to see if he could work with state officials toward some kind of resolution. In checking with legal counsel, however, Allen reportedly was told no deal was possible.

Stiens and current County Clerk Melinda Patton said they don’t know how the mistake was made in the first place or who wrote the ballot measure in question. The clerk’s office is responsible for compiling ballots and getting them printed.

Patton was appointed to the post by Gov. Eric Greitens in late May. Her predecessor, Karen Leader, resigned suddenly on April 10 a few days after the April 4 election that included the Independence Township levy question.