Sep 23, 2024
WICHITA, Kan. (KSNW) — Sedgwick County Commission candidates discussed housing at a forum on Monday. KSN co-hosted the forum as part of the Wichita Journalism Collaborative's Priced Out reports on the future of housing. The forum featured Celeste Racette, a Democrat, and Stephanie Wise, a Republican. Both are running for the Sedgwick County commission seat currently held by David Dennis. County commission candidates were asked about the topic the Wichita Journalism Collaborative is currently focused on: homelessness and the cost of housing. Textron Aviation workers go on strike People asking questions at the forum had mixed takeaways. One attendee said she felt the candidates' knowledge of housing services was lacking. "It's obvious they're not familiar with those systems," said Traci Terrill. "We need to get them on board ASAP. They need to get education from the service providers because they're ultimately the ones who are going to fund this ... That was disappointing." Another attendee asked about plans to increase affordable housing options for young people in Wichita and said the candidates often did not have fully-fledged plans to tackle housing issues. "They kept saying these things like, 'We need to fix affordable housing, we need to fix affordable housing, we need to increase affordable housing, we need to lower taxes.' but they weren't ever giving tangible, like, 'This is what we're going to do to fix these issues,'" said Eden Penny. One of the topics candidates said voters were most concerned about was property taxes. Both said they'd like to ease the tax burden on property owners. Wise said that would mean narrowing down what property tax revenue is used to pay for. "Separating property tax income and sales tax income, ensuring that the property tax income only pays for county core services and sales tax pays for quality of life services," Wise said. Racette said commissioners need to review the county's finances to see where taxpayer funds are going. Boeing makes a ‘final offer’ to striking workers, but union says it’s not good enough "To look and see who are we giving tax relief to besides those who are the middle class," said Racette. Other topics discussed included homeless encampments at Lake Afton and the effectiveness of a housing-first approach. You can watch Monday's forum in the video player below: Another forum will be held on Tuesday. It will feature District 2 candidates Sarah Lopez and Jeff Blubaugh and will be held at 6 p.m. at the Friends University Alumni Auditorium, Davis Administration Building.
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