City growth plan compromise sought

Commissioners consider making some planning guidelines flexible

Players in Lawrence’s growth debates for years have argued about whether the city’s long-term planning document was a strict set of rules or a flexible guide.

Planning Commissioner David Burress offered this suggestion Wednesday: Why not make it both?

He suggested that revisions to the commercial chapter of Horizon 2020, the city-county long-range plan, include language to indicate which provisions are non-negotiable and which are elastic.

“We need some clear language,” Burress said, “so we don’t end up fighting about what the language (of the provisions) means.”

The idea picked up quick support from Planning Commissioner Ron Durflinger, who often opposes Burress on contentious planning issues.

“Sounds like a good idea,” Durflinger said. “On those items that we don’t want to back down on, we ought to make it clear.”

But the idea wasn’t universally praised. Kirk McClure, a Kansas University associate professor who works with planning issues, said the non-negotiable provisions would probably become negotiable.

“People will say, ‘Yes, this is the requirement, but this is why it should be waived,'” he said. “It’s so complex that we need 10 good citizens (the planning commission) to sit in a room and review these proposals carefully.”

Almost since Horizon 2020 received final approval in 1998 from the Douglas County Commission, critics have accused the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission of ignoring the document to allow developments that don’t follow it.

Proposed revisions to the commercial chapter of Horizon 2020 include:¢ A requirement that any developer who wants to create a new regional commercial center pay for a city study on the potential effects on Lawrence’s marketplace.¢ A change in the designation of downtown, from the city’s “primary regional commercial center” to “regional retail commercial/office/cultural center.” South Iowa Street would be the only area of town designated a regional commercial center.The revisions are online at www.lawrenceplanning.org/longrange/compplanupdate.html.Comment on the revisions will be taken at 6:30 p.m. March 4 in the Lawrence Public Library, 707 Vt.

Defenders of that approach have argued Horizon 2020 was a flexible document that shouldn’t be interpreted so strictly as to choke off the city’s growth.

Burress’ suggestion could clear up some of those debates, assuming commissioners don’t become embroiled in a fight about which points are hard and fast and which aren’t.

“Identifying areas in the plan that need to be taken word-for-word and those that need to be taken as a guide could be beneficial — provided you could get the individuals to agree on those points,” said Jean Milstead, interim president of the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce and chairwoman of the committee that developed Horizon 2020 during the 1990s.

Burress suggested such debates would be short, at least for the nearly complete revisions to the document’s commercial chapter.

“They’ve already had the fights in the subcommittee,” he said. “The commission won’t want to repeat that.”

Besides, he said, those debates will happen sooner or later.

“It’s a real political decision,” he said, “how intensely you want to enforce some of the stuff in here.”

The commission will take public comment on revisions to Horizon 2020’s commercial chapter at 6:30 p.m. March 4 in the Lawrence Public Library, 707 Vt.