photo by: John Young

New Lawrence City Manager Tom Markus flashes a smile as he is introduced at a City Commission meeting in March at City Hall. Seated next to Markus is Assistant City Manager Diane Stoddard.

At the recommendation of Lawrence’s new city manager, the City Commission agreed Tuesday to reduce their meetings from four to three each month.

Before City Manager Tom Markus arrived in Lawrence, he said in February the city held an “awful lot” of City Commission meetings. He said Tuesday that in his two months here, he’s found things “really start to jam up” for city staff having to prepare the follow week’s agenda starting the morning after a City Commission meeting.

“It moves so fast sometimes I don’t get to think on some of those issues and work with staff to make changes and suggestions on how we can make things better,” Markus said. “I don’t suspect any of us will work any less under this new schedule, but we’ll be more efficient in our process.”

Commissioners voted unanimously to approve the change. Once the new ordinance goes into effect, the commission will hold regular meetings on the first and third Tuesdays of each month. The second Tuesday of the month will be a consent agenda with a work session on a small number of issues.

The old schedule calls for commissioners to meet every Tuesday except the fifth Tuesday of a month.

Two Lawrence residents submitted letters opposing the idea. No one spoke against it at Tuesday’s meeting.

The work sessions will be open to the public and broadcast via live stream, Markus said, and he’s recommending a public comment period be established at the end of the work sessions. Commissioners will take no formal action at work sessions.

Markus gave examples Tuesday of what topics could be discussed during the monthly work sessions, including the issue of a new police facility and the East Ninth Project.

“We brought him in to shake things up, right?” Commissioner Matthew Herbert said. “We might as well let him shake.”