LINDSBORG, Kan. — The Lindsborg City Council Monday night approved a 2026 health insurance renewal carrying a 15 percent premium increase. In that regard, the city is very fortunate in that some cities Freedom Claims, the city’s benefit manager, works with are being quoted increases of between 40 and 50 percent, and in a few cases much more than that. The city’s coverage is via Blue Cross-Blue Shield through the Kansas Municipal Insurance Trust.
Council members approved the sale of historic tax credits it received from recent preservation work at City Hall to Union State Bank of Wichita, netting the city $23,718. Since the city doesn’t have income tax liability it is able to sell the credits, which in this case the bank can use as a credit towards the privilege taxes it pays annually.
The purchase of new records management hardware and software from Tyler Technologies was approved for the Police Department at a cost of $46,000. Director of Public Safety Terry Reed said the system they have been using since 2019, which was a group purchase with the McPherson County Sheriff’s Office, has never worked right for them. In addition to being able to interface with the system Municipal Court uses, officers will be able to write “digital tickets” in their patrol vehicles. This purchase was budgeted for 2026, but Reed said due to cost savings in other areas they have funds available to make this purchase now.
The Council approved the purchase of replacement fire hose and new hose for a pumper truck they are scheduled to receive next year. Total cost comes to just over $12,000. For the Fire Department, Rodney Ryans and Logan McBeth were appointed to the department. It approved a revised contract with the state of Kansas Set-off Program, under which the costs related to use of it will move from the city to the party owing the city money. Also approved was the annual agreement with Rural Fire District 8, which houses their equipment at the Lindsborg Safety Center, carrying a three percent cost increase from this year.
A land license was approved for an 80-acre site that will be used for application of sludge from the city’s wastewater treatment plant. The city had been contracting with a company to haul off that sludge, but the cost of that was projected to significantly increase for 2026. The city will be paying an annual fee to the landowner of $300 an acre.
Council members also approved the designation of Lindsborg as a Purple Heart City, and heard an update on a diversion channel project, including follow-up with landowners along a proposed drainage diversion channel and conversations with the Kansas Department of Agriculture related to how this project will impact new floodplain maps now being developed.
