TONGANOXIE NEWSLETTER
Following months of budget work sessions, and hearing from community members, organizations and City department heads, the City Council adopted the 2027 City Budget on September 8, 2026. The 2027 Proposed Budget increases the total City property tax rate by 0.776 mills, or 2%, compared to the current year mill levies. The City General Fund and Debt Service Fund maintained a flat mill levy compared to the prior year due to offsetting adjustments, while the City Library Operations Fund is projected to increase by 0.401 mills and the City Library Employee Benefits Fund is projected to increase by 0.375 mills. This increase in 2027 follows a total City combined mill levies change of -5.737 mills, or 12.7%, from 2021 through 2026. Advancing infrastructure improvement projects has been a focused goal of the City Council, and has an extensive list of projects including the 14 St and East St corridor improvement (design being completed this year with construction expected to begin in Spring/Summer ‘27), the Waste Water Treatment Plant expansion (Phase 1 underway and a loan from KDHE secured), the tenth consecutive year of increased funding levels for street maintenance and preservation, repainting the water tower by the Middle School, and water plant telemetry equipment replacement. These capital projects represent approximately $15.75M in community improvements. th Additionally, after hearing from Community Groups and examining community amenities, additional funds were provided to support the Water Park and funding requests from groups including: Tonganoxie Business Association, Tonganoxie Arts Council, Tonganoxie Community Historical Society, Tonganoxie Framer’s Market, Tongie Days & The Mayor’s Tree Lighting Community Events, Tonganoxie After Prom & Project Grad Committees and the Leavenworth County Developmnet Corporation. While the annual budget document relays the prioritization of the City’s various assets, programs and services, it is equally important to acknowledge the critical roles of the City Council’s leadership and policy vision, the efforts of City employees to deliver services and manifest that vision, and the larger Community’s engagement with their local government to help develop key programs and initiatives. The City Council’s commitment to the Strategic Plan continues to drive policy decisions, and the growing and diversified tax base is reflective of those efforts. Fall 2026 City of Tonganoxie, Kansas Approved City Budget FY 2027 focuses on infrastrcuture
How $1 of FY2027 property tax is distributed amongst the taxing entities in the City of Tonganoxie Tax District (includes USD 464, Leavenworth County, the City, the Library and the Recreation Commission)
www.tonganoxie.org
Both Tonganoxie Police Chief Greg Lawson and Fire Chief John Zimbelman have made a commitment to having each of their public safety be forward facing to the community and to be as fiscally responsible and accessible as possible. To that end, the Tonganoxie Fire Department (TFD) has been diligent in the pursuit of grants to offset taxpayer burden. In 2025, TFD was awarded a FEMA Assistance to Firefighters Grant in the amount of $169,272 for the purchase of new Air-Pak equipment; due to a Federal Government closure and delay in funds, we were able to make that purchase this year. Additionally, this year TFD was awarded a $5,000 grant from the Henri Masonic Lodge presented to the TFD for the purchase of smoke detectors. The fire dept will install these free of charge for qualified residents. The Tonganoxie Police Department (TPD), continues the focus on community based policing, and participates in and has attended numerous community outreach activities. Specifically, TPD promotes participation on the Crime Stoppers program sponsored by the Kansas City Crime Commission, and the “P3 Tip” program geared for high school and middle school students. TPD also invited the public to participate and use the Multiple Interactive Learning Objectives (MILO) program, which is the interactive tool used for training for de-escalation tactics in deadly force encounters. Locally, TPD continues to work with the County Counselor’s Office to increase the safety of our citizens. Tonganoxie continues trend as a leader in Community Safety
TPD Officer Jones and Detective Taylor had the opportunity to stop by and support some amazing young entrepreneurs!
Firefighter Alexis McNeill accepts a check for $5,000 from the Henri Masonic Lodge presented to the TFD for the purchase of smoke detectors. The fire dept will install these free of charge for qualified residents.
Main Street mill and overlay project In June 2026, City staff prepared a RFP for a street maintenance project for Main Street, from US 24/40 to 4 St, for a mill and overlay. Mill and overlay is a structural rehabilitation process that grinds off 1.5 to 2 inches of damaged asphalt and replaces it with hot-mix asphalt. The City was glad to receive three bids for the project, and advanced a contract with Little Joe’s, the low bid in the amount of $148,351. We were fortunate to coordinate that work to be completed while USD 464 was not in session. th As the work was being performed, we received questions and feedback about previous Main Street maintenance work. To clarify, in 2021, the City contracted for micro-surfacing work in many locations throughout the city, including this stretch of Main St. Micro-surfacing is a thin, preventive maintenance slurry applied as a 1/4-inch wearing coat to seal good roads. This process extends the life of the asphalt, and costs about 25% of what a similar mill and overlay project costs. In this case for Main St, this cost saving measure allowed for 5 years of extended use without incurring the cost of a mill and overlay project.
Chieftain Park NEW Playground equipment The Tonganoxie Recreation Commission (TRC) announced that the playground at Chieftain Park will be closing Monday, October 26th for an exciting renovation project. Installation of the new playground will begin in November with a completion date expected by March 1st. The new partially fenced playground will feature a turf surface, increased accessibility for all abilities, a challenging rope tower, double the slides of the current playground, shade structures on several structures and much more. Because of the plan to complete the significantly larger Chieftain Park project generally at the same time, TRC and City staff also solicited quotes from the same vendor to replace playground equipment in the Stone Creek Neighborhood Park. Due to potential savings from elimination of mobilization charges for the secondary project and the ability to lessen future maintenance complexity by remaining consistent with manufacturer of equipment compared to using other different vendors, a series of quotes with different playground equipment options was collected from Gametime via Cunningham Recreation. The TRC and City staff are happy to partner on these projects, providing much needed updates to wonderful Community aminitites.
Renderings of the new equipment purchased and the playground design for Chieftain Park, anticipated construction this Fall and completion by early Spring ‘27. Additionally, new equipment will also be installed at the pocket park in Stone Creek, along with some surprise green space renovations. These updates represent a $1M investment in the current Parks system.
Leadership Groups visit Tonganoxie
This Fall, both City and USD 464 staff met with two groups of Leadership Oriented programs. The first visit was from Global Ties Kansas City, with a delegation of 20 visitors from Latin America, who are engaged in the International Visitor Leadership Program titled “We the People: Youth in the Political Process.” The program is sponsored and funded through the U.S. Department of State, and we are excited to join larger communities like Washington D.C. and Kansas City, to showcase what smaller communities can accomplish. We also met with the Leavenworth County Community Leadership Program (LCCLP) 2027 cohort, a group of 12 individuals from throughout the County. Each member of the cohort is in a ledaership role with their respective agency, and are interetsed in expanding their civic engagement. It was a pleasure to meet with each group, and both programs provided an excellent opportunity to exchange ideas and discuss the issues currently impacting the municipality.
14th St and East St design continues BG Consultants, the City’s on-call Engineers, are making great progress on design of the new 14 St intersection on US 24/40, the extension of 14 St, and an extension of East St from the grade and middle schools campus. We expect that design work to be completed later this Fall, and hope to have the project under construction in Summer 2027. City staff have also made application for approximately $3.5M in grants from the Kansas Department of Transportation’s Access Management and Cost Share Programs; we expect to know more about those grant determinations this Fall. Goals of this project include improved access for school related traffic, extension of trails and connectivity, and opening new development opportunities. th th
Projected Milestones:
Fall 2026 - Design completed
Fall 2026 - KDOT grant outcomes Spring 2027 - Financing options
Summer 2027 - Construction commences Fall/Winter 2028 - completion
Mark your calendars
Mayor’s Tree Lighting
School Food Drive - November 16th-19th Parade - November 21 , 5pm Downtown st Tree Lighting - November 21 , at the conclusion of parade st Gallagher Park Downtown by water park
Spooktacular
Trick-or-treating with our downtown businesses
Friday, October 30th 6pm - 8pm 4 St - Downtown th
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