Living-wage proponents aren’t as happy as they had hoped. Business leaders aren’t as sad as they feared. Wal-Mart hasn’t received permission to build, but Bo Harris has. Taxes are up; heated political rhetoric is down … for now.

And there’s still 18 months to go before the next Lawrence City Commission elections.

Six months ago this week, three candidates supported by the Progressive Lawrence Campaign — Mike Rundle, Boog Highberger and David Schauner — were swept into office. Along with Mayor David Dunfield, the four were seen to form a “smart growth” commission supermajority that was expected to bring radical change to City Hall.

While there have been changes, they haven’t been as striking as some expected. Yet.

“The phrase I use is ‘moving the center,'” Dunfield said. “It doesn’t do any good to jump from one extreme to another, because those kinds of movements can’t be sustained.”

‘They’ve listened’

After the election, some Lawrence executives — worried that “smart growth” meant “no growth” — talked about taking their business out of town. At least one did.

But Larry McElwain, chairman of the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce, said those fears hadn’t been realized.

“I’ve found (commissioners) open to meeting with me and discussing things,” McElwain said. “As far as the chamber’s concerned at this point, they’ve listened to us and our proposals.”

McElwain couldn’t say, however, whether the new commission had affected Lawrence’s business climate for good or ill.

The current Lawrence City Commission will mark six months in office next week. Despite predictions of radical changes in city policy with the seating of a supermajority of smart-growth proponents in April, the commission's changes haven't been as striking as some expected. The commissioners, shown during discussion Tuesday at City Hall, are, from left, David Schauner, Boog Highberger, David Dunfield, Mike Rundle and Sue Hack.

“At this early stage,” he said, “I can’t say one way or another.”

Julia Gilmore Gaughan, Progressive Lawrence’s chairwoman, said commissioners spent much of their first six months wrestling with budget issues — a process that resulted in a nearly 10 percent property tax increase for 2004.

That didn’t leave much time for other policy initiatives, she said.

“Now we’re getting to the point where commissioners can spend their time and energy on things that can shape the community,” she said.

Looking for proof

Progressive Lawrence started in October 2001 with the intent of challenging the political dominance of what the campaign called the “growth machine”: builders, real estate agents and developers.

So when Progressive Lawrence candidates swept the April election, Lawrence builder Bob Dannevic decided it was time to take his business elsewhere.

“The commission was touting the smart growth, and it really made me nervous,” Dannevic said.

¢ 6News video: Lawrence City Commission expected to approve living wage¢Highberger’s pre-election interviews¢Schauner’s pre-election interviews¢Rundle’s pre-election interviews

He invested more than $2 million in creating a new housing development in De Soto. Land is relatively plentiful and inexpensive in that Johnson County town, as it is in Eudora, Tonganoxie and Baldwin, he said — but not in Lawrence.

“That’s not all because of the city council,” Dannevic said. “That’s because there’s nothing out there to buy.”

Dannevic continues to live in Lawrence and watches commission meetings on television.

“I do think they are making it more difficult,” he said. “If you watch the City Commission meetings, they make it pretty difficult for developers to come in. They want traffic studies on everything.”

Otherwise, he said, “I don’t have any real specific examples” of how development is getting more difficult.

Developments approved

But Bobbie Flory, executive director of the Lawrence Home Builders Assn., said not much has changed.

“I think they thoroughly study the issues on the table,” she said of commissioners. “It has not changed our doing business to this point — business as usual.”

Commissioners say their record shows they’re friendly to good development. Developer Bo Harris’ plans to build a condominium-office complex in downtown Lawrence received approval, even though there was some mild neighborhood opposition and concerns were raised by historic preservationists about its height. And they’ve approved housing developments in the Barker and Quail Run neighborhoods in east and west Lawrence, respectively.

“This commission has approved all kinds of developments,” Schauner said. “I think people tend to focus on Sixth and Wakarusa, but that’s a mischaracterization.”

Going to court

Sixth Street and Wakarusa Drive, of course, is where Wal-Mart wants to build a new store.

It was the previous, seemingly more development-friendly commission that rejected Wal-Mart’s first plans to build at the northwest corner. And it was the previous commission that, as one of its last acts April 1, declared Wal-Mart was a “department store” of the sort prohibited from the site.

The new commissioners, once in office, enthusiastically embraced that approach. And they took it a step further, initiating rezoning to reduce the potential size of any building allowed on the site.

The result has been lawsuits from Wal-Mart and 6Wak Land Investments, the landowner, and a series of hearings and appeals at City Hall.

The commission’s stance has earned praise from neighborhood groups that opposed Wal-Mart. Caleb Morse, president of the Lawrence Association of Neighborhoods, said it was the commission’s best act so far.

“I think that’ll probably have the most significant impact on preserving those neighborhoods in northwest Lawrence,” he said.

And some commissioners list the battle among their most significant accomplishments.

“We at least temporarily halted inappropriate development at Sixth and Wakarusa,” Highberger said.

Bill Newsome, a partner in 6Wak, declined to comment. But one of 6Wak’s lawyers, Roger Walter, in June suggested the issue might have been resolved under a different commission.

“Obviously,” he said then, “the slate of no-growth (city) commissioners with a political agenda are driving the agenda on this matter.”

Living wage

The other significant issue of the current commission’s first six months was the “living wage.”

Progressive Lawrence candidates campaigned throughout the spring on a promise to require companies receiving tax breaks to pay their employees at least 130 percent the federal benchmark for poverty for a family of three. This year, that means a minimum $9.53 an hour.

When the commissioners took on the issue, though, living-wage proponents were surprised. Commissioners indicated a willingness to adopt a policy, instead of an ordinance. Though the position later changed — an ordinance now is being pursued — it helped earn the living-wage plan support from the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce.

Highberger, in particular, took hits from constituents for seeking middle ground on the issue.

“I feel he’s doing his best to make a compromise,” Graham Kreicker, a member of the Kaw Valley Living Wage Alliance, said in August. “I fear that in the process of doing so, he may be weakening the intent of a living-wage ordinance, and perhaps alienating a tremendous number of people who voted for him.”

Compromise

Highberger’s efforts, though, allayed some concerns at the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce.

“We’ve tried to reach out, and we’ve had a good experience, so far,” McElwain said. “This issue could have set a precedent that could have been hard to overcome.”

Highberger agreed. The living-wage requirement won’t kick in until a worker has been employed 60 days; he didn’t want that rule, but accepted it to create broader support for the measure.

“I think it’s a solution that will be longer-lasting and have broader public support than the one imposed by a majority that didn’t listen,” he said.

And living-wage proponents have toned down their criticisms.

“The current details aren’t everything we’ve wanted,” said David Smith, an alliance member, “But we respect their wish to listen to many different people.”

All ears

Listening, all sides seem to agree, appears to be a hallmark of this commission.

“There tends to be more discussion,” said Commissioner Sue Hack, the lone commissioner not seen as a “smart growth” proponent. “People are really listening to their fellow commissioners as decisions are being made. I think that’s really admirable.”

And despite predictions of a “smart growth” monolith, there has been only one 4-1 party line vote: The commission’s approval last month of changes to the commercial chapter of Horizon 2020, the city-county long-range development plan. The majority commissioners changed the plan to limit the size of so-called “community” commercial developments; Hack was the lone opponent, for the only time in the first six months.

But there are issues lurking that could lead to a return of heated debate.

An adequate public facilities study, which will examine ways the city can lead Lawrence’s growth — and pay to lead it — could lead to higher development costs for builders. Flooding conditions in North Lawrence will be closely examined. And development standards of all sorts are being revised.

The stage is set, in other words, for “no growth” allegations to make a return. Rundle, though, isn’t worried.

“It is, to me, such a bogus piece of rhetoric, that it’s hard to take it seriously,” he said. “I certainly don’t get up in the morning to see what I can do to prove I’m not a no-growther.”