25 years ago: South Lawrence trafficway lawsuit headed for Kansas Supreme Court

From the Lawrence Daily Journal-World for Oct. 22, 1989:

The legal battle over the proposed south Lawrence trafficway continued this week as the Kansas Supreme Court prepared to hear oral arguments in the case. Attorney John Lungstrum, representing the Douglas County Commission, and Donald Strole, attorney for the plaintiff Leslie Blevins Sr., were each to have 30 minutes to present their arguments. Blevins had filed suit against the City of Lawrence and Douglas County in August 1987, challenging the legality of the city and county each issuing $4 million in bonds for the trafficway. (The balance of funds for the proposed 14-mile road was to come from state and federal sources.) The county had approved the bond issue in August 1985 and had already begun selling the bond when Blevins’ lawsuit was filed. The case had been dismissed by a Douglas County District Judge in February 1988, but then Blevins had claimed the county illegally had used its home rule ordinance powers when issuing the bonds. The city had also participated in the illegality, Blevins claimed, through a joint planning resolution signed in 1985. Blevins had taken the case to the Kansas Court of Appeals in September 1988, where the district court decision had been upheld; Blevins had then filed an appeal with the Kansas Supreme Court in March 1989.