Wichita council rejects delay of one percent sales tax vote

An effort by Wichita Mayor Lily Wu to delay the city’s one percent sales tax vote to the August primary election has failed.

The mayor called a special meeting for Wednesday to discuss delaying the election, but only two members of the seven council members voted to support the delay: Wu and Mike Hoheisel.

“When there’s new information that is presented to a council, I believe it’s prudent for us to pause or have a discussion, as we’ve done today,” Wu said. “I still am uncomfortable with the lack of guardrails.”

Wu wanted to delay the vote until August after the city learned last week that about 26,000 voters, or about 10 percent of eligible Wichita voters, would have to go to new temporary polling locations during the March 3 vote.

Some council members said that the vote needed to occur in March to address deferred maintenance issues at the city’s fire and police stations, as well as helping to fund the city’s homeless shelter.

“Postponing only pushes those costs in the future,” council member Dalton Glasscock said.

Many who spoke during public comment at Wednesday’s special meeting were supportive of moving the sales tax election to August to give residents more time to learn about the sales tax.

They also shared the same concerns the mayor had about the temporary polling location changes.

That included Chase Billingham, a Wichita State sociologist who often comments on the City Council.

“It was just late last week that we all learned that about 10% of all potential voters in this election would face additional confusion regarding where to vote, which would inevitably lead to depressed turnout in this election,” Billingham said.

The council will discuss the sales tax proposal at a Jan. 27 workshop meeting.

This story was originally published January 14, 2026 at 2:49 PM.