‘We need cooperation’: Missouri State Auditor pushes for data on Jackson County assessments

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. (KCTV) - It’s been nearly 16 months since the Missouri State Auditor was made aware of possible issues for Jackson County property tax assessments, now he said his office had to issue court orders to try and get the audit finished.

In early Fall 2023, Missouri State Auditor Scott Fitzpatrick said his office started looking into Jackson County assessments.

In December 2023, his office released a preliminary audit stating that at the Jackson Assessment Department failed to comply with state law and property values that increased more than 15% are likely invalid.

While they’ve waited months for answers from the County, Fitzpatrick said they haven’t gotten what they need.

“Everybody has been waiting, everybody has been waiting a long time and we wanted to let them know why they are waiting,” said Missouri State Auditor Scott Fitzpatrick.

He said his team is trying to get the data on the actual assessment process: how long the workers were there and what documentation was gathered.

“The county indicated that they don’t have that information and that information if we wanted we would have to go directly to their vendor to get that data,” said Auditor Fitzpatrick.

They issued a subpoena last month to Data Cloud Solutions, which is believed to house some of those records for the county.

The State requested GPS data and reports from 757 parcels to get just a sample of how the assessments were done.

“This is a very key piece of data and this scope limitation the whole meat and potatoes of this audit is really reliant on getting this information,” said Auditor Fitzpatrick.

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Below is the subpoena sent to Data Cloud Solutions. This was obtained by KCTV5 News through the Missouri Sunshine Law.

They gave a deadline of December 30, 2024, but didn’t receive a response.

Auditor Fitzpatrick said they will attempt to subpoena the company one more time and if they don’t get a response, they will have to go to court.

They also sent a subpoena to the Jackson County Board of Equalization for closed meeting minutes. The auditor didn’t get that information as well.

KCTV5 News reached out to the vendors used by Jackson County for comment on these subpoenas but did not receive a response.

Jackson County sent a statement to KCTV5 on Thursday in response to the subpoenas:

Jackson County has been and continues to be committed to full cooperation with the Missouri State Auditor’s Office throughout the auditing process. We have worked openly with the Auditor’s Office to provide information and facilitate their review.

The subpoena recently requested by the Auditor’s Office pertains to data and information held by third-party vendors, such as Data Cloud Solutions, which Jackson County utilized during the 2023 reassessment. While this information resides with those vendors, the County has actively worked with the Auditor’s Office to obtain the requested data and ensure it is made available. We are confident that this information will further validate the processes and procedures used during the 2023 reassessment cycle.

Jackson County remains dedicated to transparency and accountability and will continue to work closely with the Auditor’s Office to ensure all questions are fully addressed and all procedures are thoroughly explained.

With other ongoing legal battles and a trial set to start on January 13, Auditor Fitzpatrick said delays in responses make it difficult to get the audit done.

“This is kind of the last thing left to provide answers to the people of Jackson County about what happened and to the county itself to make sure that the next time they go through a reassessment they don’t screw it up like they did this time,” said Auditor Fitzpatrick. He added, “We need to wrap this up for the people of Jackson County, and in order to do that we need cooperation and we’ve gotten some of that but we haven’t gotten enough.”

He said it concerns some people who paid under protest, filed appeals and the local government agencies who rely on tax revenue for property tax assessments.

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“The people that have appeals that are outstanding a lot of them have probably a significant financial need to know what the outcome of this is going to be for them. Can they afford to live in the home that they own anymore,” said Auditor Fitzpatrick. He added, “What we are doing is providing information at this point when the audit comes out to the taxpayers and to the county and the county legislature to say this is what went wrong in your reassessment, these are the things we recommend you do to make sure that this doesn’t happen again.”

The audit was initially set to be finished by 2024, but these new court orders could delay it for months.

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