Lawrence City Hall is pictured in this file photo.

Lawrence city leaders will soon discuss whether they should ask Lawrence voters about changing the city’s form of government, including the possibility of having a directly elected mayor.

The Lawrence City Commission will discuss the potential changes as part of its meeting Tuesday. A task force previously considered the issue in 2021, but the commission did not come to a clear consensus on how to proceed and directed city staff to defer the discussion until this year.

The city has not reconsidered its government structure in 70 years, and in 2021 the commission created a task force to study the issue. In May 2021, the task force voted unanimously to recommend that the city consider a system with a directly elected nonpartisan mayor and a six-member commission elected by districts. The task force report cites the goals of providing fair representation, increasing voter engagement, encouraging more civil discourse, and, in the case of a directly elected mayor, providing more continuity on the commission.

There was not a consensus on the commission regarding whether to put the creation of districts on the ballot, and two commissioners expressed interest in a hybrid system that included both commissioners elected by district and commissioners elected at large. The commission subsequently discussed the possibility of only moving forward with a ballot question regarding whether the city should transition to a system with a directly elected mayor. In August 2021, commissioners ultimately decided they didn’t feel comfortable moving away from the full recommendation with so little time before the next election. The commission would have needed to pass a resolution by Sept. 1 to put the question on the Nov. 8 general election ballot. The commission asked that the topic return for discussion in January of this year.

City staff are asking commissioners to specify which changes, if any, they would like to further consider for a ballot measure. In a memo to the commission, staff set forth the following options and state that the city is free to choose any of the state’s recognized forms of government or some combination.

• Proceeding with the task force’s recommendations:

o Have a direct election of a nonpartisan mayor to a four-year term. The mayor would be elected by the City of Lawrence voters at large;

o Create six districts in the city. Six nonpartisan commissioners would be elected by their district in staggered four-year terms (three district representatives elected every two years).

• Proceeding with the resolution from August that did not include the recommendation regarding districts:

o Have a direct election of a nonpartisan mayor to a four-year term. The mayor would be elected by the City of Lawrence voters at large;

o Have four nonpartisan city commissioners elected by the voters at large with each commissioner being elected to staggered four-year terms.

The Lawrence City Commission will convene at 5:45 p.m. Tuesday at City Hall, 6 E. Sixth St.

The proposed change to a directly elected mayor would represent a move from the commission-manager form of government to mayor-commission-manager. Neither the task force nor commissioners have called for moving away from the city’s practice of employing a professional city manager to oversee the city’s day-to-day operations. The directly elected mayor would have the same amount of power and duties as the mayor does currently, including presiding over meetings, recommending appointments to city advisory boards and representing the city in ceremonial roles.