photo by: Rochelle Valverde/Journal-World

Lawrence City Hall, 6 E. Sixth St., is pictured on Jan. 31, 2023.

The City of Lawrence says it’s “at an impasse” in contract negotiations with a group of unionized city employees and will have to find a resolution through the Lawrence City Commission.

The city announced in a news release Thursday that a bargaining unit including central maintenance, engineering, technician, building maintenance and parks field employees had reached the end of their contract negotiation period without agreeing on a resolution. That group first filed a petition to unionize under Teamsters Local 696 last year in late March, becoming the third city employee group to unionize under the Teamsters. As the Journal-World reported at the time, there were 70 employees in the employee group.

According to the release, the two parties presented their final proposals to a fact finder in mid-September and subsequently met to resume negotiations, but they couldn’t reach an agreement on two issues related to additional compensation and one related to the contract grievance resolution process.

The next step, according to the release, is a public hearing before the City Commission. According to the agenda for the City Commission’s next meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 7, commissioners will consider setting a date for a public hearing as part of their consent agenda. City staff is recommending commissioners set that date for two weeks later on Nov. 21. Ahead of the hearing, both the city and the unionized employee group will submit final proposals in writing to the City Commission, and commissioners will make a final decision to resolve the impasse.