Lawrence Journal-World opinion section

A Lawrence City Commission subcommittee made up of Commissioners Lisa Larsen and Matthew Herbert was right to recommend Tuesday night that Mike Amyx continue as the city’s mayor until January 2017.

Amyx is the most experienced city commissioner and has served the city well since taking over after Mayor Jeremy Farmer resigned last August. The commission can finalize this issue next Tuesday by following the subcommittee’s recommendation and continuing with Amyx as mayor.

Normally, mayoral terms in Lawrence run from April to April. City commissioners select the mayor at the first city meeting following the April city election. There is no rule governing whom commissioners must select, but tradition has held the person who receives the most votes in the election is chosen mayor and the person receiving the second-most votes serves as vice mayor. The vice mayor moves into the mayor’s role the following April.

In April 2015, Farmer became mayor and newly elected Commissioner Leslie Soden took over as vice mayor. When Farmer resigned, commissioners chose Amyx to serve as mayor instead of Soden. At the time, Soden and her fellow commissioners said they thought it would be best to have the more experienced Amyx fill the remainder of Farmer’s term. That was wise — Amyx’s 17 years on the commission and four previous stints as mayor cast a long shadow over the other commissioners, all rookies.

Besides, nothing changed for Soden — she would take over as originally scheduled in April 2016 to serve her one-year term as mayor.

But then the Kansas Legislature complicated matters by changing the election schedule for municipal elections to November, pushing back the next Lawrence city election from April 2017 to November 2017.

That left the question to commissioners of when to make a change in the mayor’s office. After studying the issue for a couple of weeks, Larsen and Herbert came up with a logical plan: Have Amyx serve 17 months as mayor and then get the commission back to one-year mayoral terms that run from January to January. Soden will still get the chance to serve, but this way, she’ll have eight more months of experience when she takes over.

Soden and Amyx indicated they support the recommendation. It’s time to formally appoint Amyx as mayor through the end of the year and move on to more pressing issues.