When they met Thursday, members of the city’s Business Retention Task Force debated whether the city should create a new development ombudsman position. The ombudsman would be the lead person to help developers and businesses navigate the city’s multi-step development process.

Interestingly, the primary flaw cited by opponents of creating the position is that it would take so long for an ombudsman to become familiar with the various city departments that are a part of the development process — the planning, neighborhood resources and public works departments, just to name a few.

That seems to imply that it would be too hard for a city employee to learn and stay up to date on all of the hoops businesses must jump through to get approval for their projects. If it’s too big a job for a city employee to stay abreast of those processes, how on earth are developers and business owners supposed to navigate the maze?

Large development firms can afford to hire professional planning firms to decipher the system, but committee members who favored the ombudsman thought the position would be important to small businesses that can’t afford to hire help.

Is it any wonder that Lawrence has such a negative reputation as city in which to do business?

Lawrence is all about small business. A list of the county’s largest employers supplied by the Lawrence Chamber of Commerce lists only five employers with more than 1,000 workers; only 10 employers have 500 workers or more. Only one of the top five is a commercial operation; the other four are government entities.

That means that most of the companies that are the backbone of the local economy are small businesses. The community should do everything it can to support those businesses and their expansion efforts. Many small businesses may only expand their facilities once every 10 or 20 years. There’s no reason for them to stay up to date on the details of the city’s development process. If it’s too much trouble to have a city employee on board to guide them through a system they only use every decade or so, what message does that send? Not the message that we value their business and the contribution they make to Lawrence’s economic well being.

If the city’s development process is too complicated for even a full-time city ombudsman to grasp, maybe there’s something wrong with the process. Rather than adding an ombudsman, maybe the city could simplify the system so an average resident can make sense of it.