To the editor:

The City Commission continues to read comments in the paper about the lackluster leadership in Lawrence, but it seems to do no good. All they think of is ways to spend money.

What this City Commission and the school board and the County Commission do not get is that property taxes are the primary reason business is reluctant to locate here. If anyone is in denial about that, then ask yourself, why did Deciphera want a full 100 percent tax rebate? Why? Because taxes are too high.

We should not be paying more than 1 percent of the total valuation of our property. When the school district stops its gluttonous spending, which at present is consuming almost 60 percent of tax payments, only then will everyone benefit.

Workers now are coming in from surrounding towns and counties to work. They take wages from Kansas University, the city of Lawrence and the county, not to mention from private employers and take that money back to their home communities to spend. There is no labor force here.

Talk of this being a bedroom community is nothing new. Hercules in Johnson County and DuPont in Shawnee County have drawn many workers from Lawrence. The difference then and now is that local employers such as KU, the city of Lawrence and USD 497 no longer have their employees living in the town they work in.

David Holroyd,

Lawrence