Category: Business

How to sell your business

Every business needs a succession plan.

That is the advice of Don Scaro, who will be leading a seminar that will help businesses develop a succession plan. This will be particularly helpful for those who are considering selling their businesses.

The seminar, sponsored by Business West, will be held at 11:30 a.m. Monday, Aug. 31, at the West Wyandotte Library, 1737 N. 82nd St., Kansas City, Kan.

Four panelists will make presentations telling the various aspects of a succession plan and the “do’s and don’t’s” when selling a business. Those attending will learn that a good succession plan will help assure a business sale is successful.

The panelists are Greg Goheen, a lawyer with McAnany, Van Cleave and Phillips; Lesley Johnson, an accountant with Johnson Financial Services; Marc Winkler, the owner of Midwest Better Business Brokerage; and Scaro, who is the owner of Benefits Design Group.

The cost of the seminar will be $20 and includes lunch. Checks should be made out to Business West and mailed to P.O. Box 12905, Kansas City, KS 66112. Payment through PayPal will also be accepted.

For more information, telephone Business West at 913-766-4300 or 913-406-6266 (cell) or email murrel@mcbconsultinginc.com.

Registration being accepted for KCKCC’s Innovation Summit

by Kelly Rogge

Registration is being accepted for the Innovation Summit Oct. 2 at Kansas City Kansas Community College.

Inventors, entrepreneurs and anyone who has a creative idea may benefit from the event, to be held from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m. at KCKCC’s Thomas R. Burke Technical Education Center, 6565 State Ave.

At the pitch competition, entrepreneurs will pitch their ideas in front of judges including venture capitalists, investors, other entrepreneurs, business leaders and the community.

Participants will compete in one of two divisions – concept-idea and revenue generating. Additionally, this year, the competition will have a national platform. Friends, family and investors from around the nation can view a video of the pitch and cast their votes online. This provides a wider viewing audience for the product or service participants are presenting at the competition.

Those attending the event and listening to the pitches will each receive the same amount of innovation summit currency to give to their favorite ideas.

Attendees will have 90 minutes to tour the room and visit with each pitch person-entrepreneur in order to learn any additional information to make their innovation summit currency investment.

At the end of the event, organizers will count the innovation summit currency for each entrepreneur, which will play a part in determining who moves onto the final round to pitch in front of the judges. Participants are competing for a chance to win a share of $10,000.

Once registration is complete, staff at KCKCC’s Center of Workforce Development and Entrepreneurship will help participants in preparing their pitch. Submissions for entry into the pitch competition must be received by Sept. 13.

To register for the 2015 Innovation Summit or for more information, visit the Innovation Summit’s website at www.innovationsummitkc.com. Information is also available by contacting Alicia Hooks at 913-288-7388 or by email at info@innovationsummit.com.

Kelly Rogge is the public information supervisor for Kansas City Kansas Community College.

Penney’s challenging appraised value of Village West store

Is this J.C. Penney store property at 10904 Stadium Parkway, Kansas City, Kan., in Village West, worth $7.9 million or $4.9 million? The Kansas Court of Appeals recently heard a case on it and sent it back to a tax court for further proceedings.
Is this J.C. Penney store property at 10904 Stadium Parkway, Kansas City, Kan., in Village West, worth $7.9 million or $4.9 million? The Kansas Court of Appeals recently heard a case on it and sent it back to a tax court for further proceedings.

Case remanded to tax court

The J.C. Penney store at 10904 Stadium Parkway, Kansas City, Kan., was the topic of a decision last Friday in the Kansas Court of Appeals.

The Penney Corp. was appealing the appraised value of its store in the Village West area of Kansas City, Kan.

Wyandotte County appraised the store’s value at $7,925,000 for the 2011 tax year, while Penney’s said the value was $4,950,000, according to court documents. The store has 99,146 square feet of retail space on 8.48 acres of commercial property.

In March of 2014, the Court of Tax Appeals agreed with the Unified Government that the appraised value of $7,925,000 was “fully supported.”

Penney’s appealed the decision to the Kansas Court of Appeals, which last week reversed and remanded the COTA ruling.

Penney’s argued in its appeal that COTA erred in denying Penney’s earlier motion for recusal, and claimed it was denied a hearing before an impartial panel of judges. Wyandotte County maintained that the panel was impartial. The basis for the request for recusal stemmed from some previous cases in another county not involving the Penney property, but involving another property with the same attorney with some of the same judges.

Two of the three judges from this 2014 case are no longer with COTA, according to court documents.

The Kansas Court of Appeals reversed COTA’s order on the value of the property and sent the case back for rehearing before different COTA judges. The Court of Appeals did not rule on whether Penney’s other claims had merit.

If the UG’s valuation eventually stands, it would mean a payment of around $336,000 for that tax year. But Penney’s wants about 40 percent off the UG’s valuation figure.

The Target store next door to Penney’s had an assessed value of about $8.6 million in 2011.

The Unified Government, in the past few years, has been making contracts with some firms that have large commercial properties, and has been requiring payments in lieu of taxes, instead of property taxes.