Do the city and county really need to hire someone to remind people to turn off the lights when they leave a room?

Obviously, officials have other jobs in mind for a new “sustainability coordinator,” but it seems that most of their goals could be achieved without creating a new position and a new salary.

At their Tuesday meeting, Lawrence city commissioners agreed to request up to $100,000 in federal stimulus money to fund the new position. That’s fine for the first year, but who will pick up the cost after that? City officials hope to share the ongoing cost with Douglas County, but it’s still local tax dollars.

Commissioners said they thought the new coordinator would be able to save the city enough in energy costs to offset his or her salary. It would be even better, however, if the city and county could achieve the same energy savings with their existing staffs without adding to the payroll.

Why can’t this task be handled by the city’s new auditor, who already has uncovered some interesting numbers related to Westar’s billing for city streetlights? Once the auditor has identified ways to conserve energy and save money, someone in each city/county department could be designated to ensure compliance with the auditor’s plan. Having someone within the department reminding people to turn off the lights would be far more effective than having an energy czar.

If the city thinks this job is too much for the auditor to handle, they might consider using stimulus money to contract with an outside firm to examine the city’s energy efficiency. Doing this on a contract basis likely would be far less expensive in the long run than creating a new position that would include a salary, benefits and perhaps some new support staff.

The $100,000 for the sustainability coordinator is part of the city’s effort to find uses for $858,600 that it is eligible to receive from the federal Energy Efficiency and Conservation Block Grant program. It would be a shame not to claim that money, but it’s always better to use such one-time money on one-time expenses rather than using it to create jobs or programs that require ongoing funding. The other projects approved by city commissioners for that funding are good examples of that: new heating, air conditioning and lighting for the Lawrence Public Library and new streetlights downtown.

It may not be unreasonable to think that a new sustainability coordinator could save the city more than his or her salary, but if the city could figure out how to achieve those savings without increasing its staff, they would be able to save just that much more.