photo by: Austin Hornbostel/Journal-World

The Douglas County Commission heard from representatives with the county's Heritage Conservation Council and historical societies during a work session Wednesday, April 12, 2023.

Historical societies in Douglas County are starting to think about how they can work together in new ways and reach more students and underrepresented groups in the community.

That was the message from Douglas County Historical Society Executive Director Steve Nowak at a work session with the Douglas County Commission on Wednesday afternoon. Nowak and members of the county’s Heritage Conservation Council were providing an update to county leaders about how agencies like the county’s historical societies are working to make their efforts less individual and more collaborative.

“… It’s really made us start to think about our organizations in a different kind of way, and to think about how we can achieve a centralized purpose in a common way,” Nowak told commissioners. “I think we’ve done kind of a transition into establishing new forms of working relationships, and also thinking about how … our activities are actually supporting a vision for heritage preservation and interpretation that is bigger than just the individual visions of our own organizations.”

The group of heritage partner agencies that were part of the discussion Wednesday included five historical societies, Freedom’s Frontier National Heritage Area and the Black Jack Battlefield Trust. Nowak said they’ve all been collectively deciding what their shared goals and responsibilities should be for 2024, something he called a first for the agencies.

In part, that’s because all of them are encountering the same challenges. One challenge is a lapse in on-site attendance from school groups, which Nowak said is a prolonged effect of the coronavirus pandemic — not just in Douglas County, but even at Kansas City’s National WWI Museum and Memorial, Nowak added.

“Our school groups have still not recovered,” Nowak said. “This time of year (before the pandemic), I’m sure all of our sites were really booked up with field trips. They just disappeared during the pandemic, and they’re just not coming back at that same level. It’s what’s making us realize maybe we need to think about new ways that we can still fulfill an educational purpose for the school systems.”

Nowak said the agencies determined there may be ways to work with students other than traditional field trips. He said that if schools were interested in using historical artifacts as part of their curricula, museums were in a unique position to help with that.

“We have a great opportunity, as heritage organizations holding collections, to work with the school districts in new ways,” Nowak said.

And that’s not to mention the other opportunities ahead of the collective, Nowak said, like their shared resources, expertise and staff, or their capacity for facilitating programming that can engage underrepresented groups in the community.

Other ways to address the challenges facing the agencies may end up being more tangible. One example, Nowak said, could be bringing on a part-time research assistant this summer to bolster their capacity to fulfill more elaborate or time-consuming public research requests.

In other business, commissioners:

* Approved the county’s health care plan renewal.

* Approved a supplemental budget request of $29,700 from Kansas Holistic Defenders, to be used by the agency for immigration consultations, office space rental costs and a case management system. The funds had already been planned for in the county’s 2023 budget.

* Approved a couple of requests related to zonings and land use — a rezoning request to categorize roughly 2 acres at 1749 East 1500 Road north of Lawrence as a “light industrial” district and a conditional use permit request for 1629 East 800 Road just west of Lawrence to use a converted barn as a space to house events.

* Heard an update from a governmental relations firm about the Kansas legislative session.