It makes sense for the city of Lawrence to conduct a thorough review of the fees it charges for facilities and services and to increase fees where appropriate. Failing to do so places an undue burden on the city’s taxpayers and unfairly asks nonusers to subsidize facilities and services at rates similar to heavy users.

City Manager Tom Markus said last week that the city has a policy in place that calls for fee evaluations at least once every five years, but that the policy has not been followed in the past. Markus, as with other issues during his first few months on the job, is ready for that to change.

“I think a lot of times elected officials and cities get themselves into building buildings, and they think because they built the building that that’s the end of it,” Markus said. “So you pay for the building, but to keep the building up you have to have some stream of revenue established, which we’ll be facing in years to come.”

Markus is right. Maintaining city facilities costs money and the brunt of those facility costs should be borne, as much as possible, by the individuals who most use the facility.

That hasn’t always been a priority for Lawrence city commissioners.

Commissioner Leslie Soden defended the current fee structure, saying taxpayers should subsidize city activities. “We’re a government; we’re not a business,” Soden said. “We’re not a profit-driven center — that’s not what we’re about.”

But the city doesn’t have to pursue profits with user fees; rather, fees should be used to help ensure fairness in how city facilities and services are funded. Low user fees keep sales and property taxes artificially high, which become barriers to the city achieving its goal of providing more affordable housing.

The city says Lawrence charges about $3 million less per year in user fees than comparable cities in Kansas. That indicates there is opportunity for the city to both increase fees it already charges for services and facilities and to consider implementing fees for services and facilities that are free. A user fee for access to Sports Pavilion Lawrence at Rock Chalk Park would be at the top of that list.

The city’s three-legged funding stool includes property taxes, sales taxes and user fees. It makes sense for the city to make sure the fees it is charging aren’t undercutting the other two legs of the stool.