Name and office sought: James Walters, District 7 commissioner, Unified Government.
Age: 68
Occupation: Architect. Experience: designing sport facilities nationally and internationally, including Sporting Kansas City stadium in Wyandotte County.
Education: Bonner Springs High School; University of Kansas: Bachelor of Environmental Design; University of Kansas: Bachelor of Architecture.
Organizations, clubs, groups to which you belong: Urban Land Institute, Avanti Owners Association International
Reasons for running: Making Wyandotte County a better place to live by increasing job opportunities, increasing investment in our county, increasing the tax base, increasing the number of people living in Wyandotte County and lowering taxes. All these contribute to being able to make improvements to our community to improve livability and sustainability.
- Effective use of infrastructure funds. Develop strategies among commissioners and pressure staff to implement those improvements.
- Redeveloping and repopulating portions of our communities that have been abandoned. Public – private partnerships to make transformational changes. Incrementalism takes too long.
- Reducing tax burden on WyCo residents.
a. Work with other taxing authorities within the county to reduce mill levy,
b. Work with state to reformulate how community colleges are publicly funded,
c. Work with the state to revise how automobile registration taxes are calculated,
d. Increase tax base and focus on tax relief.
If you are an incumbent, list your top accomplishments in office. Lowering of the mill levy, construction of the juvenile detention facility, constructing the Quiet Zone in Edwardsville and Bonner Springs.
Have you run for elected office previously? When, results? yes, 1975, University of Kansas Student Senate, 2013, 2017 UG Commissioner. Results were awesome!