Lawrence City Commission candidates hammered on clear differences related to the issues of growth during the last public forum before Tuesday’s primary election.

At a forum sponsored by the League of Women Voters and the Voter Education Coalition, candidates Sunday differed on the central question of whether growth in the community was paying for itself.

“Let’s be very clear: Growth does not pay for itself,” said City Commissioner David Schauner, who is seeking a second term. “We are robbing Peter to pay Paul. All the new tax money derived from growth is going to pay for costs associated with it.”

Schauner had company in his camp. Jim Carpenter said he was confident that a study the city currently was conducting would find that residential growth did not pay for itself.

The notion didn’t make sense to other candidates.

“Residential growth is going to pay for itself,” Doug Holiday said. “If we don’t grow and become a stagnant city, that is when we really will have to worry about increasing our taxes.”

Greg Robinson said candidates who said growth did not pay its own way were taking too narrow of a look at the issue.

“All they want to talk about is rooftops,” Robinson said. “But you have to ask what else comes with those rooftops. We have Michaels, we have a Target, we have a Home Depot because of those rooftops. And we have the sales tax money that comes with those developments. The others don’t ever want to talk about that.”

Growth benefits

It’s time for voters to make up minds Candidates debate growth during final forum Threat of school closures draws candidates to Baldwin school board race Candidate selector Candidate profiles Candidate chats More in Election 2005

The other candidates in the field didn’t clearly say whether they believed growth paid for itself, but many suggested they weren’t convinced growth was creating as many negative consequences for the city as some believed.

George Grieb noted that developers pay 100 percent of many costs — such as sewers and roads — of new neighborhoods. Tom Bracciano, a school district administrator, said growth was extremely important to the school district because it receives funding based on a per-pupil formula. Mike Amyx said he thought growth and the tax revenues it created was an important way to pay for maintaining and updating older neighborhoods. And City Commissioner Sue Hack said residents needed to keep the city’s situation in perspective.

“It is important that we drive out to western Kansas every once in a while,” Hack said. “A lot of those towns would give anything to have this type of question at this type of forum. We can’t lose sight of that.”

David Holroyd said he thought city leaders spent too much time talking about abstract planning terms and not enough time applying common sense to the planning process.

“If I were to stop in one of those western Kansas towns and ask them about smart growth, they would ask if that is something you fertilize with,” Holroyd said. “There seems to be nothing realistic about our growth planning.”

‘Follow the money’

Schauner took the issue of growth and development one step further by urging voters to consider whether developers were backing certain candidates. He suggested voters go the Journal-World Web site and investigate who has contributed money to certain campaigns.

“The old adage in politics is to follow the money,” Schauner said.

That brought a response from Grieb, who has received contributions from both developers and nondevelopers.

“I think instead of focusing on where the money comes from we should worry about the City Commission being fairly represented by all the diverse interests in the community,” Grieb said.

A crowd of more than 70 people filled the auditorium at Lawrence Memorial Hospital to listen to the forum. Voters will narrow the field of candidates from nine to six during Tuesday’s primary election. The general election April 5 will determine the winners of the three at-large seats on the commission.