State Treasurer Choose 1
The Kansas state treasurer acts as the chief financial officer for the state’s bank. The state treasurer is a member of the Pooled Money Investment Board and the Committee on Surety Bonds and Insurance, and is board trustee of the Kansas Public Employees Retirement System.
Biographical Information
What qualifications and accomplishments make you the best candidate for this position?
Candidate has not yet responded.
As Treasurer you are a Trustee on the KPERS Board. How would you work to solve the issue of the underfunding by the State as Employer to make its required contributions going forward and makeup the amounts that have been deferred?
Candidate has not yet responded.
How would you work to improve transparency on issuing contracts, hiring personnel, and preventing patronage appointments?
Candidate has not yet responded.
Biographical Information
phone
(913) 229-5530
Campaign Email
juan@jcfortreasurer.com
Campaign Web Site
http://jcfortreasurer.com
Campaign Phone
9132295530
Campaign Address
9401 Indian Creek Parkway, Suite 120. Overland Park, KS 66210
Mailing Address
9401 Indian Creek Parkway, Suite 120
Overland Park, KS 66210
Overland Park, KS 66210
Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/jcfortreasurer/
Personal Biography
See below under notes
Community/Public Service
Boards that I currently serve: Mental Health America of the Heartland (6 years), Builders Association (3 years), Kansas Democratic Party Hispanic Caucus Chair (4 years)
Education
Bachelors in Communication from Penn State University. Certificates from Dartmouth College, U Penn Wharton School of Business and Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Business
Ballot City
Olathe
County
Johnson
Notes
Juan C. Luengo was born in Venezuela and immigrated to the U.S. in 1989. He grew up in Miami, Florida, before heading to Penn State University, where he earned his B.A. in Communication. A position with the National Soccer Coaches Association of America brought him to Kansas City. In 2008, he was recruited into insurance and found his calling in risk management. He went independent in 2016, building his own agency, and in 2021 he sold it to become CEO of Engage Insurance Group in Overland Park. Juan volunteers his time to organizations he's passionate about, including Mental Health America of the Heartland and The Builders' Association, and is an advocate for the construction industry, the business community, and protecting children. Soccer has remained a constant. A lifelong player, Juan has coached youth soccer for 20 years, including a decade at St. Thomas Aquinas. He lives in Olathe and is a family man and a father of a 10-year-old son.
What qualifications and accomplishments make you the best candidate for this position?
I've spent two decades managing risk for a living. As CEO of Engage Insurance Group, I help Kansas businesses protect what they've built by planning for what could go wrong. That's exactly what the Treasurer does with public money: safeguard it, invest it prudently, and make it work for those it belongs to.
This is a stewardship role. The office manages the state's cash and investments, runs Learning Quest 529, returns unclaimed property, and supports small businesses and farmers through linked-deposit lending — disciplined financial work I've done my career.
My preparation fits: a Penn State degree, the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses program, and certificates from Dartmouth and Wharton. I sit on the boards of Mental Health America of the Heartland and The Builders' Association (AGC), and chair the Kansas Democratic Party's Hispanic Caucus.
I'll modernize the office, widen its reach, and advocate for a nonpartisan Kansas Economic Council to report plainly on our economy.
As Treasurer you are a Trustee on the KPERS Board. How would you work to solve the issue of the underfunding by the State as Employer to make its required contributions going forward and makeup the amounts that have been deferred?
The frustration is legitimate, and I share it. From 2016–2019, Kansas delayed, froze, and cut the contributions it owed as an employer. Nearly $360 million pushed into the future and still being repaid over twenty years, on top of a $10 billion unfunded liability. I’m very concerned because these are the livelihood of our state employees for retirement.
I'll be straight: the Treasurer is one of nine KPERS trustees. The Board doesn't appropriate money and doesn't design the tiers, but it has a fiduciary duty, a vote, and a statewide platform, and I'll use all three. I'll insist the Board certify and publicly report the full required contribution every year, treat any future deferral as a red line, and push to accelerate paydown of the deferred debt whenever the state runs a surplus.
On KPERS 2 and 3, I'll seek honest actuarial studies and advocate for reforms that strengthen these benefits, not balance the system on the workers who earned it. The guarantee stays.
How would you work to improve transparency on issuing contracts, hiring personnel, and preventing patronage appointments?
Public money demands public trust, and this sits at the heart of two of my five platform pillars: Pillar 5, A Treasury That Works for Kansas, and Pillar 3, A Kansas Economic Council.
A Treasury That Works means open operations. Every significant contract this office issues, investment managers, banking, the 529 program, unclaimed-property vendors will go through a competitive, published process, with clear criteria and awards explained on the record. No sole-source deal without a written, public justification. The office will post every opening, hire on merit, and require conflict-of-interest disclosure and recusal from anyone involved in an award.
The Economic Council reflects the same principle I'll bring to the whole office: qualified people, chosen for their expertise, reporting to Kansans in plain language not patronage, not politics. A contribution will never buy a job or a contract in my office.
Full platform: jcfortreasurer.com