photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

Douglas County Clerk Jamie Shew, pictured in the center of the standing group, listens to a Douglas County resident during a town hall meeting Thursday, Dec. 1, 2022.

Douglas County residents have no shortage of questions and concerns about what a new map of Douglas County Commission districts should look like, and time is already running short to decide on one.

The County Commission has less than a month to adopt a new map of commission districts that adds two seats to the current three-member commission; per state statute, the deadline to do so is Jan. 1, 2023. Douglas County voters overwhelmingly approved expanding the commission in the November election, and they got their first chance to share feedback on the process and some early map options at a town hall discussion Thursday night at the county fairgrounds.

Much like a late September town hall meeting about a different item of county business, a possible project expanding Wakarusa Drive south of Lawrence, part of Thursday’s meeting saw the public broken into small groups with county staff facilitating discussion and taking notes. Summaries of those smaller discussions were then shared with the whole group, and later will be compiled on the county’s website so folks who weren’t able to attend can take a look.

Some topics differed from group to group, but they all generally shared the same key points — for one, that whatever map the commission approves has the appropriate amount of rural representation. Multiple groups said they want there to be a requirement that the county must have a certain number of commissioners elected from rural areas.

Most groups also wanted to know more about how exactly the county’s two new commissioners will be chosen. That part, Douglas County Clerk Jamie Shew said, is decided by Gov. Laura Kelly based on a recommendation from the Douglas County Commission. That could either involve a special election, which must take place within a certain period after the County Commission adopts its new map, or it could mean waiting to fill the seats until the 2024 election process.

Plenty of discussion also revolved around four preliminary map options that county staff shared earlier this week. That included “Spokes,” a map with five districts extending out from the City of Lawrence at the center like the spokes of a wheel, and a “County” map that guarantees one commissioner would hail from outside Lawrence thanks to one district taking in all of the county’s smaller cities and unincorporated areas.

Yet another map, titled “Wakarusa,” was intended to keep the Wakarusa Township area south of Lawrence as whole as possible. That, Shew said, was a response to the statewide redistricting process completed earlier this year that saw Lawrence carved out from the rest of Douglas County and added to Kansas’ sprawling 1st Congressional District.

“One of the things that has really bothered me about (statewide) redistricting was how Wakarusa was split up so badly,” Shew said. “What if we tried to keep Wakarusa as whole as possible and not make them the place we split everybody just like they did for the House, the Senate and so forth?”

Other questions of note were about whether a district encompassing the areas of the county most likely to be affected by the $4 billion Panasonic battery plant coming to nearby De Soto would be viable and the true cost of adding two commission seats.

County staff told attendees Thursday night that though the commission’s last scheduled meeting of the year is set for Dec. 14, it will keep meeting around the holidays until it has approved a new map. In the meantime, county leaders like Commissioner Shannon Reid said it’s important for residents to make their voices heard to help guide the decision-making process.

“To me, and I think my fellow county commissioners would agree, this is an opportunity for increasing representation, along with fostering more engagement with and understanding of how our county government serves all residents, across all districts,” Reid said.

The Douglas County Commission is set to discuss the new districts again at its Dec. 7 meeting, taking into account feedback from the town hall. County leaders invited the public to attend and offer comments at that meeting as well, or to do so via a feedback form available on the county’s website.