Lawrence city commissioners listen as Police Chief Tarik Khatib discusses his department's need for a new headquarters facility. Voters in November rejected a proposal to fund a 8 million facility with a sales tax increase, but commissioners are now reopening a discussion on other options.

The Lawrence Police Department has not changed its position on needing a new, larger facility to serve as its headquarters.

And architects who were hired to assess the department’s needs haven’t changed their opinion that building a new facility from the ground up would be wiser than trying to retrofit an existing building.

But Lawrence city commissioners said Monday that they’ve listened to voters who, in November, rejected a proposal to finance a new $28 million facility with a sales tax increase.

On Monday night, they tried to start anew, holding the first of what will certainly be many public meetings to hear comments from city staff and the public on how to move forward.

But some residents who turned out for a lengthy study session Monday night said they were still skeptical of the project.

“What I hope is that this is going to get the full attention it deserves,” Lawrence resident Greg Robinson told commissioners.

Robinson was among about 20 residents who turned out for the meeting. He said he fully believed that the project will get built, and that, “the taxpayer (and) voter is not going to get what it asked for in the election.”

Commissioners, however, insisted that a new facility is not a done deal, at least not yet, and some said they were offended at the suggestion they were trying to “ramrod” a project into the budget.

“I was not on the commission when this was voted on. When I was elected, a lot of people said they wanted to take a different route,” said Commissioner Matthew Herbert.

Specifically, Herbert said, the new commission has effectively agreed that a new facility will not be funded with a sales tax increase. And he said if it does get built, the city would not buy any new property, but instead build on property the city already owned.

“So to say we’re ramming it through and ignoring voters, frankly that’s something I resent,” Herbert said.

Those comments came near the end of more than four hours of discussion during which Police Chief Tarik Khatib and several ranking officers in the department reiterated their position that current facilities — which are divided between the Joint Law Enforcement Center downtown and the Investigation and Training Center, or ITC, on the city’s west side — are too small and too inadequate to meet the department’s current needs.

Also during the meeting, architects Andy Pitts and James Estes described how they made an assessment of the department’s needs, and why they recommend building an entirely new facility from the ground up instead of trying to remodel and expand the ITC.

“It is not the norm to find facilities that, once you purchase a building, you can renovate it and make it comparable to a new facility,” Estes said. “You will not have a police facility; you will have a facility that is housing a police department. And you’ll quickly find it doesn’t perform like a modern police facility should.”

Commissioners also heard reports Monday that the Police Department is not the only part of the law enforcement community suffering from inadequate facilities.

Elizabeth Hafoka, the supervising city prosecutor, made a pitch to house the municipal court and the city prosecutor’s office in a new police facility.

She said the current court facility, which the city rents, is too small and lacks adequate security. And she said security problems will become even more serious in 2018 when, under new state law, the city will be required to allow anyone to carry concealed weapons into the building if it doesn’t install enough security measures to prevent all individuals from bringing in weapons.

“The majority of people we deal with are professional and polite,” she said. “But some are under stress, or they’re dealing with substance abuse and mental illness. They blame staff for being the source of their problems. I would urge you to act preventatively for security in the municipal court.”

She noted that since Jan. 1, police have been called to the municipal court building 92 times to deal with different kinds of disturbances.

Commissioners took no formal action at the meeting. But they did authorize Mayor Jeremy Farmer to work with the city manager’s office to develop a timeline for additional study sessions and public meetings, starting sometime after commissioners finalize the 2016 budget in August.