The Lawrence City Commission will vote Tuesday on proposed changes to Horizon 2020, a document that outlines the city’s priorities and guides policy making and development decisions.

Work to create Horizon 2020 first started in the early 1990s, and it was officially adopted in 1998, said Jeff Crick, a city planner tasked with working on the changes. Efforts to update the comprehensive, long-range plan began in early 2014.

Crick said the document deals with “big, high-level items.”

“Some of the things in the public’s mind have changed a little bit, and we want to make sure it is what the public envisioned it to be — not what they envisioned 20 years ago,” he said. “It just needs freshened up to get it ready for a longer life.”

After more than a year of public surveys, open houses and other discussion and research, the Horizon 2020 Steering Committee voted unanimously Aug. 31 to send forward 19 items that need to be studied and changed.

The Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Committee voted 9-0 on Sept. 21 to advance the changes to the city and county commissions.

The City Commission will review and vote Tuesday on a report that lists the changes. Because Horizon 2020 pertains to unincorporated Douglas County, county commissioners will also vote on the report at their Wednesday meeting.

If both bodies approve the updates and adopt a joint resolution to coordinate the changes, city staff will begin the process of revising Horizon 2020.

“If both of them agree to adopt it, the report will become the work plan for staff to continue forward,” Crick said.

Areas of change

Some of the changes, including those regarding retail development, development incentives and the city’s growth, echo recent discussions among city commissioners or are related to items that will soon be brought before the commission.

A few of the proposed updates to Horizon 2020 involve creating more availability for retail in areas that are already developed.

One of the provisions includes the city studying incentives to encourage the redevelopment of existing retail areas. The report states retail should be fostered “in locations that best fit the community and utilize the community’s existing infrastructure and investments.”

Another update asks city staff to modify the city’s land development code to increase opportunities for small neighborhood retail to be incorporated within the existing development pattern.

The report states that “many residents” see neighborhood retail as “beneficial to the overall sense of community.”

There has been debate in the city about the size and location of new retail developments after a development group last year proposed a 500,000-square-foot shopping center for the interchange at the South Lawrence Trafficway and Iowa Street.

The Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission rejected the proposal. At the time, some planning commissioners said they would prefer a large retail development be located in areas already zoned for commercial development near the Rock Chalk Park sports complex in northwest Lawrence.

In August, the Planning Commission approved a proposal from the same development group for a smaller retail and restaurant space — approximately 250,000 square feet — that’s also planned for the South Lawrence Trafficway/Iowa Street interchange.

The City Commission is expected in December to discuss the proposal. The item is tentatively scheduled for Dec. 8.

Concerns about the proposal brought up by residents and at least one city commissioner include whether the city can sustain new commercial developments and whether they would pull shoppers from downtown. Those concerns are indirectly addressed in the updates to Horizon 2020.

According to the report on changes to the document, Lawrence residents “placed an emphasis on maintaining downtown as a strong and stable part of the economy and culture of Lawrence.”

Encouraging public and private investment in downtown and development of the riverfront were both listed as new items to include in Horizon 2020.

The report also asks that the city ensure there is “socially and economically responsible growth of urban areas.”

Other proposed changes to the comprehensive plan are related to job growth, affordable housing, transportation and arts and culture, among other things.

When studying changes to Horizon 2020, the creation of employment opportunities was “clearly an issue of high concern,” the report states.

The Horizon 2020 Steering Committee is proposing the document include that the city should create policies to support the community’s high-tech infrastructure needs because “infrastructures such as fiber, telecoms, etc. are vital to a prosperous economic future,” the report states.

Other actions include studying potential incentives to promote downtown Lawrence as a place of employment; creating policies that support and grow local small- to medium-sized businesses; and providing development-ready sites to large-scale employers.

Crick said the 10-member steering committee would continue to meet with city staff as changes are made to the long-range plan. The committee is made up of business owners, city employees and other Lawrence or Douglas County residents.

Mayor Mike Amyx and Douglas County Commissioner Nancy Thellman are the committee’s co-chairs.

The City Commission meets at 5:45 p.m. at City Hall, 6 E. Sixth St.