photo by: Rochelle Valverde/Journal-World

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

Ahead of the Nov. 7 general election, the Journal-World asked the six candidates running for three seats on the Lawrence City Commission — incumbents Brad Finkeldei, Amber Sellers and Courtney Shipley, former commissioner Mike Dever, and newcomers Dustin Stumblingbear and Justine Burton — to share their thoughts on a series of finance-related topics, such as the city’s budget priorities and property tax rate.

The deadline to register to vote in the general election is Tuesday, Oct. 17, and advance voting by mail or in person at the Douglas County Elections Office, 711 W. 23rd St., begins the following day.

City water and sewer rates approved as part of the 2023 budget process will see a 10.25% increase next year and an 11% increase in 2025, and the state’s largest electric utility, Evergy, wants to increase electric rates in Lawrence by more than 9%. Do you think city leaders should take any action to expand utility assistance?

Sellers said it’s “critical” for the city to revisit utility assistance and that research shows that households spending more than 10% of their monthly income on utilities consider the expense a burden. She also mentioned the city’s existing program serving elderly residents with income restrictions, and said there’s room for it to expand to impact a much wider population.

“Based on the last report to the Commission, it was estimated that funding would impact the General Fund, yet it would account for less than 1% of the total operating budget and positively impact over 4,800 unique households,” Sellers said. “I remain committed to ensuring this topic comes back to the Commission for a more in-depth and meaningful discussion for the 2025 budget.”

Burton expressed concern about how individuals with fixed incomes will have a more difficult time paying for utilities given such increases, and said some funding should be put into place now to offset the added expense. She added that given the city’s goals of eventually converting to all-electric operations, work should be taking place to develop a formula for possible rebates and paying the majority of the cost for residents to convert old furnaces from gas to electric power, for example.

Shipley said while the city doesn’t have any influence over the rates of utility companies such as Evergy, Lawrence’s utility assistance parameters “fall within best practices at this time.” Shipley said the city’s utility rates are reevaluated every year, and commissioners make sure to do so in the context of current conditions.

Finkeldei said the city should be continuing to look at ways to expand its utility assistance. The City of Lawrence already has some forms of voluntary utility assistance — a discount program serves residents 60 and older with very low income, and another program created in 2021, funded by donations from other utility customers, provides one-time utility assistance to households experiencing financial hardship. But Finkeldei said the city program needs to grow, and the city should also be looking at using housing dollars, including state and federal funds, to help people pay their utility bills.

Dever said part of the reason Lawrence is in the midst of a housing crisis is because of how much it costs to live here, including utility rates. He said there should be room in the city’s budget for “helping people who are on the margins” and in need of some utility assistance. That could mean offering decreased rates, or even forgiveness or reimbursement, for developers building affordable or workforce housing.

Dever said he hopes utility rate increases are a short-term issue that evens out in the long run as Lawrence grows its tax base. He said he’d also consider using some of the surplus money in a future budget that collects more property tax dollars than the year prior for a utility assistance trust fund of some sort.

Stumblingbear said he recognizes that both the city and other local organizations currently provide limited utility assistance to Lawrence residents, but city leaders should also be sure to acknowledge that monthly utility bills are a factor as part of the monthly cost of housing, especially when it comes to discussions about affordable housing.

“As our city continues to update the infrastructure, we must consider how those costs are impacting the community’s efforts to bring accessible and affordable housing to Lawrence,” Stumblingbear said. “If we don’t look at all the forces that affect housing costs, such as utility rates, then we will forever be chasing after the idea of affordable housing.”

Though the past few city budgets — including the recently adopted 2024 budget — were approved with a flat mill levy, rising property values have meant Lawrence property owners have still seen steep increases in their tax bills. Do you plan to give any consideration to lowering the property tax rate during the city’s 2025 budget process?

Finkeldei said he “absolutely” plans to consider lowering the property tax rate during the city’s 2025 budget process.

“Since I have been on the commission, all of our budgets have been affected by COVID and ultra-high inflation,” Finkeldei said. “These led to extraordinary costs necessary to run the city. However, with inflation moderating, I am very hopeful we can find an opportunity to reduce the mill levy in the future.”

Sellers said she believes many policy considerations can be employed to support lowering property tax rates during the next budget cycle. She said for starters, she’ll continue to advocate for changes in how the Kansas Legislature mandates that cities report their “revenue neutral rate,” the tax rate needed to collect the same amount of property tax dollars as in the previous budget year. Sellers said the formula for that rate relies on the Consumer Price Index instead of the Municipal Cost Index, which she said would be a “more accurate reflection” of how cities measure the change in the prices of goods and services.

Sellers also said the City Commission should be applying pressure for state legislators to resume the Local Ad Valorem Tax Reduction Fund, a state program that has been suspended since 2002, which would set aside 3.63% of state tax collections and divide the money among counties through a formula that uses population and assessed property tax values. The funds would then be used to offset increases in property tax rates for households.

Dever said that in the eight years he served on the City Commission, he had a history of supporting a flat mill levy, and given the more dramatic year-over-year increases in real estate value in Douglas County he’d be inclined to reevaluate the current mill levy and considering reducing it.

“When I was serving, we didn’t see these types of large increases annually (to property values),” Dever said. “I think 2% annually was normal; that was pretty much what we counted on. So when you figure that inflation is basically somewhere around that, generally speaking, I feel like asking for a reduction in the mill levy when you have small increases in the actual assessed value is probably unreasonable and ends up not saving as much money as you thought.”

Burton said she would need to look at how the process works when determining how setting the tax rate works, but she said she thinks some areas of Lawrence have residents paying more taxes while residents “see no significant improvements in their communities.”

Shipley said that property values are determined at the county level, and that city commissioners give consideration to possible rates — whether higher or lower — each year as part of the annual budget process in the context of existing economic conditions and other data. She also claimed that the city hasn’t raised its mill levy rate in “at least a decade,” while both Douglas County and the Lawrence Public Library have.

According to budget records on the City of Lawrence website, the 2014 budget had a mill levy of 31.474 mills; the 2024 budget has a mill levy of 33.207 mills.

Stumblingbear said he would always be open to considering a budget with modifications to services provided in the community if that means also providing a lower tax rate to residents.

The recently approved 2024 budget includes an additional $7.5 million in net employee compensation and benefits. What are your thoughts on those pay increases, and do you think city employees are being compensated well enough for their work?

Shipley said the increases are especially important, because some areas of municipal work have trouble retaining employees. She said she thinks commissioners need to be educated on those conditions and be willing to balance those needs so the city can provide the level of service residents have come to expect.

“I think those increases are necessary not just to keep Lawrence competitive regionally, but also to recognize the importance of city employees to the community,” Shipley said. “The people who haul our solid waste, deliver our clean water (and) first responders who are there for us 24 hours (a day) deserve appropriate compensation.”

Stumblingbear also emphasized how the city employees who benefit from the additional compensation are people who “make our city function every single day.” He said it’s something he supports for that reason, and with the understanding that the move makes pay levels more competitive compared to nearby communities.

To continue that trend, Stumblingbear said the City Commission should consider annual cost-of-living pay increases — also a strategy that could help the city avoid having to implement another major increase like this one some years down the road.

Burton had similar sentiments about the importance of a raise and improved benefits for the city workers serving the community out in the field, and added that “they probably should have more.”

“They make the administrators look good,” Burton said.

Finkeldei said the city has worked hard during the last four years to fully fund the employee pay plan and keep pay competitive during a time when wages are rising across many sectors. He said he thinks the city has been able to provide wages at a level that’s allowed for retaining its workforce, but added that this will likely be a continuing challenge moving forward.

Sellers said it’s the “difficult work of the Commission” to identify how to balance wage investments with system outcomes while ensuring the city has a workforce that is representative of the community it serves. She said as a former state employee, she knows that recruiting and retaining talent in the civil servant field is necessary to remain competitive with regional, state and national job markets.

Dever said it’s reasonable for the city to pay what’s commensurate with the cost of living in Lawrence, while also being sure to maintain a level of competitiveness with other communities.

He added that pay is just one of a number of facets that employees look at, and providing a healthy environment where people want to work can often mean “pay becomes secondary,” yet still important. Dever said he wants to understand why city employees who choose to leave aren’t sticking around, and how that correlates to their level of pay and the jobs they’re asked to do.

In your view, what areas of city spending may be out of balance? 

Dever said that from the outside looking in, it’s obvious to him that the city’s administration hasn’t focused on balancing the growth in Lawrence’s tax base with the accompanying demand for government services. He said by not annexing, processing and developing land for industrial, commercial and residential uses, the city has “put ourselves behind” and the increased property tax collection of the past few years has masked some of the costs of city spending.

Dever added that the city will have to find ways to navigate and cut costs during the next budget process following the end of federal COVID-19 relief funds that have provided more flexibility in recent budgets, for example.

Shipley was one of several candidates who noted the shift in the budget process toward aligning with the long-term priorities in the city’s strategic plan, rather than the “traditional unfocused way of budgeting toward political whims.” She said the commission needs to stay focused on spending on the strategic outcomes that community members have asked the city to meet.

“That being said, I tend to keep a critical eye on (Capital Improvement Plan) projects and deliverables from contractors and vendors,” Shipley said. “And while some municipal departments have learned inefficient budgeting habits under less focused commissions, much has been done in recent years to transition them toward transparent and focused budgeting.”

Stumblingbear said he’s been following the city’s budget process since 2017, and he’s confident in city leaders’ ability to put together a coherent spending plan; it isn’t, he said, “a bunch of blindfolded monkeys throwing darts at a board.” Stumblingbear said he views the 2024 budget as a balance of the many competing values and interests in the community.

Sellers said she believes the city has invested heavily in water and wastewater infrastructure in an effort to undertake deferred maintenance projects and better position the community to budget for future capital improvements, which helps city departments break away from “historically flawed funding patterns” and instead move to a system that provides a structured approach to managing assets effectively.

Finkeldei said the city spends “far more” on infrastructure than it ever has in the past due to deteriorating roads, water lines, sewer lines and stormwater systems. 

But while he admitted that spending is out of balance at the moment, Finkeldei said the city’s worked hard to spend additional money now as a trade-off for getting “the lowest cost of ownership” in the future — that is, so that the city can see infrastructure spending decrease over time.

Burton said from what she’s heard, there’s a significant amount of funding in the city’s 2024 budget dedicated to projects in “far west Lawrence,” and she said those dollars should instead be divided up to benefit and build up all areas of the city.

What do you think the city’s been doing especially well when it comes to spending and budget priorities?

Stumblingbear said there are a number of highlights in the most recent city budget, like the creation of a Homeless Programs Department he pointed to as a response to direct comments from community members to the City Commission about homelessness. Then there’s spending like adding electric vehicles to the city’s police and fire fleets and addressing water drainage in central neighborhoods, which he also said are good moves.

Some smaller items are equally worth celebrating, he added, like making the Lawrence Loop more contiguous and adding or updating shelter facilities at city parks.

“Our community values personal health and preserving our environment and having a walkable city, and this budget reinforces those community values in more ways than I have listed,” Stumblingbear said.

Dever said this strategy of priority-based budgeting is a reasonable way of approaching the city’s budget, but he also wishes the city made more information about its budgeting model available to the public so they can understand where the data that informs budget decisions is coming from.

“As an outsider looking in, I see the benefits of this model,” Dever said. “I just want to make sure that the input into the model is uniform and based on input from a broad swath of the city, period.”

He added that he thinks the city’s Capital Improvement Plan is a good short-term allocation that will lead to long-term positive benefits, and that he is pleased to see a “laser focus” on low-income and affordable housing and a willingness to grant incentives to workforce housing developers.

Sellers also mentioned the city’s Capital Improvement Plan process, which she said has helped to modernize the city’s budget processes as a whole and align more with the vision outlined in the city’s strategic plan. She said priority-based budgeting has been another boon for the city, as it has shifted focus toward outcomes and results rather than traditional line items. She said as a whole, the level of transparency throughout the process builds public trust and increases support for the long-term health and stability of the city’s budget.

Finkeldei said the city has been making “great strides” in aligning its budget and spending priorities with its overarching strategic plan.

“This sort of priority-based budgeting is essential to good governance and appropriate spending, so to be able to spend to accomplish your goals is a huge improvement to previous budgets, which were more department-based,” Finkeldei said.

Shipley was yet another candidate to mention that the city has made strides in investing in infrastructure. She said the current set of commissioners has advanced infrastructure improvements that had been “deprioritized” by previous commissions, with stormwater, roads and public transportation being “particularly notable successes.”

Burton said the city seems to spend a lot on development, which isn’t a bad thing. But she also said she thinks aesthetics are important and she isn’t sure if the city puts much thought into how new development looks and where it’s placed.