I have a foolproof way to make Kansas a better place to live, and it won’t cost a penny. Under my plan, local government officials would be required to talk about money and taxes in plain English.

Local politicians and governments have never been comfortable spending other people’s money. Not that this stops them from doing it. It has become a cherished tradition to refer to your money and mine as “mills” and our taxes as “mill levies,” and to describe corporate tax handouts as “abatements” or “tax increment financing” agreements.

What kind of talk is that? One would never suspect this was about real bucks. I know city clerks in Kansas who still refer to property taxes as “ad valorem” taxes. I am told this is traced to the state’s earliest pioneers who immigrated westward from French and Spanish settlements where everyone spoke Latin. This explains why Kansas ended up with a school finance formula that no one can translate to this day and a very funny state motto (“Ad Astra Per Ad Valorem!”). I could go on, but I already forgot what we were talking about.

Oh yeah, we were talking about money. Moolah. Smackers. We don’t mind donating it now and then to help achieve the metropolitan area’s vision of a tax-subsidized Home Depot at every freeway interchange. But we wish our public officials would use some gibberish remover and myth repellent.

The most entertaining of today’s tax euphemisms is the term “TIF.” It stands for truly imaginary fund raising. Just kidding. It stands for tax increment financing. As a term invented by attorneys to help politicians spend your paycheck without feeling guilty, you might guess that tax increment financing is not about financing or increments. You would be right.

We’ll take it step by step and then drop dead. In a TIF agreement, your City Hall raises cash by selling revenue bonds it doesn’t own, but we can’t go into that now. “Revenue bond” is Latin for “loan made to rich, out-of-town corporation.” The money is used to pay startup costs for a shopping mall or office park that this corporation could never afford to build on it own, unless it wanted to or something. The loans are paid off over 10-15 years with any new taxes the project generates, to create the impression the corporation is paying taxes just like you and me. Nearly everyone falls for this.

To understand how a TIF works, try this at home. Let’s say you write a $3,000 check to the county treasurer to pay the real estate taxes on your house. You tell yourself, “There. I have paid my taxes like any good citizen.” Then you say to yourself, “I’d like $2,700 of that money back so I can invest it in the local economy by paying down my mortgage.” Let’s say the county treasurer — hoping that you will get lost and quit talking to yourself — agrees to return your $2,700. Did you really pay $3,000 in taxes, or just $300? If you think it’s $3,000, you’re ready to run for city council or state legislature.

Since governments don’t view taxes as real money, they assure you that these tax handouts don’t cost a dime. Unless, of course, you think governments would lie about such things. “There is no cost to the taxpayer!” proclaims a humorous brochure on tax increment financing published by the city of Olathe. Never mind that while the developer’s loans are being paid off, millions of tax dollars are diverted from vital community services such as teacher salaries and free cell phones for the city manager.

And do you have any idea how many bookkeeping hours and legal fees are required to keep track of these tax giveaway programs ? Neither do I. Just thinking about it is enough to make me go back to reading about ad valorem mill levies.

Why go through this nonsense? My plan is a better way to forge a more perfect, understandable Kansas. When we give away tax dollars, let’s just say so. If we want to subsidize a shopping mall, the only question we need to ask the developer is, “You want that in tens or twenties?”

At least we would finally understand what our government is doing with our money. And it won’t cost us one red mill. Whatever that is.

David Chartrand is a syndicated columnist based in Olathe.