The Lawrence City Commission Vacancy Advisory Committee narrowed the field of candidates to 12 on Thursday, Sept. 17, 2015. Those 12 applicants are, top row from left: Mike Anderson, David Crawford, Kenneth Easthouse, Lisa Larsen, Scott Morgan, Joe O'Brien. Bottom row from left: Terry Riordan, J. Douglas Robinson, David Schauner, Jeffrey Southard, Caleb Stephens, Karl Watson.

Lawrence moved a step closer Thursday to finding out who would be its newest city commissioner and fill the vacancy created when former mayor Jeremy Farmer resigned in August.

An advisory board helping to select the next city commissioner narrowed the pool of applicants from 14 to 12 during a Thursday evening meeting at City Hall.

Each of the 12 advisory committee members selected 12 semi-finalists and ranked them in order of preference using a point system. Committee members would give their first choice 12 points, their second choice 11 points, and so on. City Attorney Toni Wheeler and Senior Assistant City Attorney Randy Larkin tallied up the points at the end.

The applicants chosen to move forward are:

• Scott Morgan, an editor/publisher and former Lawrence school board member, with 122 points.

• Lisa Larsen, a geologist at Larsen & Associates, Inc., with 107 points

• Terry Riordan, a pediatrician and former city commissioner, with 100 points

• David Schauner, an attorney and former city commissioner, with 100 points

• Karl Watson, the chief financial officer at engineering consulting firm GPW & Associates, with 86 points

• David Crawford, a retired instructor for the International Brotherhood of Boilermakers, with 78 points

• Joe O’Brien, associate professor at the Kansas University School of Education, with 77 points

• Jeffrey Southard, a retired attorney, with 72 points

• Kenneth Easthouse, a call center supervisor at General Dynamics, with 49 points

• Caleb Stephens, an adolescent addictions counselor, with 48 points

• Mike Anderson, a late-night television host, with 40 points

• J. Douglas Robinson, a custom product sales employee at Home Depot, with 21 points.

Thursday’s voting eliminated Allison Puderbaugh, an environmental project assistant, and Kolbe James Murray, a junior at KU studying finance.

The person selected to fill the vacancy will serve out Farmer’s term, which expires in January 2018.

Farmer stepped down Aug. 12, two days after he resigned from the nonprofit food pantry Just Food when it was discovered he had failed to pay about $50,000 in federal payroll taxes.

Representatives told the Journal-World Wednesday that their own investigation alleges Farmer made $52,000 in unauthorized payments to himself over a two-year period.

During an hourlong discussion preceding the advisory committee’s vote Thursday, most committee members said they prioritized experience when reviewing candidates’ applications. They noted former city manager David Corliss’ resignation and the search for his replacement.

“On any normal given situation we could probably throw their names in a hat and draw them out and they could be on the city commission for the next couple of years,” committee member Thomas Christie said. “But we’re not in a normal situation. We only have an acting city manager, and three of the four commissioners are five months in or less. It’s going to take someone special at this time.”

Committee member Melinda Toumi recommended choosing “new people with some new ideas.”

Murray, one of the two applicants eliminated Thursday, was one of her top three picks.

“I feel like in the last election, the people who voted that day sent a very clear message that they had had enough of the experienced leadership in recent times,” Toumi said.

Next, the 12 remaining candidates will be interviewed during a public forum Sept. 24.

The Voter Education Coalition and WOW! Channel 6 will host the forum, which starts at 6:30 p.m. at City Hall, 6 E. Sixth St. Candidates will be split into two groups of six, and each group will answer questions during 90-minute sessions.

All of the candidates will be asked to answer the same questions compiled by the Voter Education Coalition. Candidates will then take questions from the public and from members of the advisory committee.

To ask questions, the public can show up in person to the meeting, submit questions via email to vecdgks@gmail.com or post on the Voter Education Coalition’s Facebook page. The forum will stream online at www.lawrenceks.org/stream.

At the end of the forum, the advisory committee will choose up to six finalists. On Sept. 29, the City Commission will publicly receive the list of finalists, and commissioners may add any other qualified people to the list.

Commissioners will decide at the end of the Sept. 29 meeting which finalists will be interviewed during a special meeting Oct. 1. After public interviews Oct. 1, commissioners will choose one or two final candidates.

The City Commission on Oct. 6 will nominate and elect the new commissioner by a majority vote.