Two weeks after the Leader printed his quote, Lehner "clarified" it. The levy still opened at 27 percent.

The 2026 budget arrived in Kenyon on August 26, 2025, in a work session that began with a correction to the newspaper and ended with a council asking for a levy one third the size of the one it had been handed. Both halves of the evening are in the minutes, and both are about the same question: who does the city's finance work, and what does it cost.

The clarification

Mary Bailey called the session to order at 5:30 as acting mayor. Elana Brunner was present, Lee Sjolander arrived at 5:50, Don Kirchmann and Abdo's Jessi Sturtz joined by Zoom, and Kim Helgeson was absent. Andrew Deziel of the Kenyon Leader was in the room. The minutes record that "Administrator Lehner started the meeting by referencing the article printed in the Kenyon Leader from the council meeting of August 12. He wanted to make it clear on how he meant to convey what is happening in the office verses what was printed in the paper. He emphasized that city staff is capable of covering the finance director's duties, but with the high volume of rework necessary, Abdo's assistance is needed."

What the paper had printed two weeks earlier was Scott Lehner's own comparison, about $200,000 for Abdo against about $130,000 for a finance director, and his own words for why the city should pay the difference: "This is way over the top. And Sue, as you know, sat in that chair and did that role. She's like, 'I can't do this.'" The August 26 clarification did not dispute a number. It changed the description of the staff from overwhelmed to capable. The $70,000 gap he had described was not revised.

I'm against doing that to people on property taxes. I know we've got to get the money from somewhere, but I don't think that's going to go over very well.Council member Mary Bailey, August 2025 work session, as quoted by the Kenyon Leader, source

The levy

Then the budget. "Administrator Lehner stated that the draft budget showed a 27.06% maximum levy." The packet's budget memo put the increase at $378,901, from $1,400,000 to $1,778,901. Two bond payments drove much of it, a new one on the 2025A bonds for the street project and one on the 2023A bonds that, in the memo's words, "should have been budgeted in 2025 for $57,000" and had not been. The draft also carried a 3 percent cost-of-living increase, a 5 percent rise in health insurance, and a library levy up 9.44 percent.

We're going to be looking to ask our citizens to pay $360 bucks (on a $200,000 home) or almost $600 (on a $300,000 home), and then there's the people who have commercial property. I don't think that's going to fly.Council member Lee Sjolander, August 26, 2025, as quoted by the Kenyon Leader.

Bailey said she was "against doing that to people on property taxes." Department heads went looking for cuts on the spot. The library director, the police chief, the liquor store manager and the public works superintendent each said where they could trim. Lehner said the budget included funding for a finance director in the fourth quarter of 2026 and that a planned full-time administrative assistant had been cut to part time, which he told the Leader "saved $92,000 on the budget." The council reached consensus to hold the increase under 10 percent, and Lehner said he would keep working with Sturtz to get there.

The council was in consensus that they would like to keep the increase under 10%.Minutes of the August 26, 2025 work session, source

Where it landed

On September 9 the council adopted Resolution 2025-23, a preliminary levy "which is a maximum of 9.93%," 4-0. On December 9 it adopted the final 2026 budget and a levy of $1,528,541, a 9.18 percent increase. The first draft had been nearly three times that. A city that opens its budget season at 27 percent and closes it at 9 has either cut deeply or drafted loosely, and the minutes show more of the second than the first: capital transfers held at the prior year's $198,000, a debt line that had been under-levied, and a finance function that, depending on which week the administrator was speaking, was either capable of the work or unable to do it.

The two statements of August 2025 do not reconcile, and the record does not try. What it shows is an administrator adjusting the description of his staff to the audience in front of him, in a month when the numbers he was responsible for had just come in 27 percent high.

Sources

1. Minutes of the August 26, 2025 work session, meeting page; budget memo in the August 26 packet; recording.
2. Kenyon Leader, "Kenyon approves new contract with Abdo," August 2025, and "Kenyon City Council discusses cutting projected levy increase," September 2025.
3. Resolution 2025-23, preliminary levy of 9.93 percent, September 9, 2025; final levy of $1,528,541, December 9, 2025.

More from the record

City Hall · Aug. 12, 2025

Lehner's own math: Abdo $200,000, a finance director $130,000. He picked Abdo.

City Hall · Aug. 26, 2025

Somebody forgot to levy $57,000 in bond payments. Kenyon found out eight months late, from the vendor.

City Hall · July 8, 2025

Payroll goes to a vendor and the administrator gets a raise, backdated, on the same consent agenda.

All 27, in order · The open letter · Every packet and recording