PAOLA, Kan. — To prevent the expansion of warehouse development across the Miami County, Johnson County line, homeowners in northern Miami County have petitioned to incorporate the City of Golden, Kansas.
“The possibility of annexation and rezoning for industrial development have raised a number of concerns for our citizens. Concerns they believe can only be addressed by city incorporation that would potentially keep Edgerton north of the county line,” County Commission Chair Rob Roberts said.
Ahead of the vote to incorporate the city, the Miami County Board of Commissioners are hosting a series of study sessions to get expert testimony about how creating that city could affect the county overall.
Wednesday, the commission heard feedback from community leaders from the City of Edgerton.
“Really Edgerton feels like it’s not our business. It’s not our decision. It’s between the landowners today and it’s a county decision,”Edgerton Mayor Donald Roberts said.
Roberts said the city will not force an annexation without consent from a property owner. He feels it’s only a matter of time before the city receives a request to annex into Miami County.
“Does LPKC cross into Miami County or is it residential? We’re happy to do both. We are happy and anxious to have a partnership. We have one with Johnson County, we would love to have one with Miami County,” Roberts said. “We border Miami County in two spots now. We border over by the proposed new City of Golden, but we also border off of Sunflower and 215th Street. We are in a couple spots now. It’s just, in my opinion, a matter of time until somebody asks to do a project and asks to consider an annex.”
Logistics Park Kansas City (LPKC) has roughly 16 million square feet of development and is currently supporting about 4,800 jobs.
Since construction began on the project, the City of Edgerton has issued multiple tax incentives to developers including tax abatements.
“The City of Edgerton does not provide an abatement directly to the company. It is not an abatement to Kabota. It is not an abatement for Amazon. It is an abatement for the vertical construction building,” Edgerton City Administrator Beth Linn said. “As part of that master agreement, while there is abatement there is a PILOT or a payment in lieu of taxes that is pre negotiated with NorthPoint that then the taxing jurisdiction does see that payment in lieu of taxes for the ten years the abatement exists.”
When the 10 year abatement period ends, city staff estimate the project will generate roughly $6million annually in tax revenue for the city.
“These are significant investments for companies. They may come and go, but the reality is from a city perspective or a county perspective, we care about the vertical development because that is where they pay taxes. Somebody will own those buildings and somebody will pay those taxes,” Roberts said.
NorthPoint Development owns a majority of the buildings within LPKC. Roberts said city records show NorthPoint Development, under a variety of LLCs, has been listed as the property owner for a majority of the annexation requests to the city.
The county commission invited leaders from NorthPoint Development to weigh in on the potential incorporation of the City of Golden. No one from the company spoke during the commission study session Wednesday morning.
The Miami County Board of Commissioners will continue hearing expert testimony for the potential incorporation of the City of Golden on Wednesday, September 22 at 9 a.m.