photo by: Mike Yoder/Journal-World Photo

In this file photo, Charles Barnes, operator of one of the city's automated pickup trash trucks, uses a mechanical arm to lift city trash bins off the street in the Prairie Park neighborhood.

The increases city staff has proposed for water, stormwater and trash rates for 2026 and beyond are part of a trend of steady increases over the past several years, and one of the utility rates — for stormwater — has nearly doubled from 2019 to the present day.

The city posts utility rates on its website at lawrenceks.gov/utility-billing/rates, and using snapshots of the page captured on Internet Archive, the Journal-World looked through how these rates have changed since 2019. (There are captures from 2017, as well, but none from 2018; 2019 is the furthest you can go back for an uninterrupted picture of the rates.)

In 2019, residential water rates in Lawrence were $6.50 per 1,000 gallons, and this year, for customers who have relatively stable water use year-round, they were at $10.27 per 1,000 gallons. That’s up 58% from 2019.

Stormwater rates are calculated using Equivalent Residential Units, which are a measurement of the impervious surfaces on a property like roofs and concrete. For one ERU, which has been defined as 2,366 square feet of impervious surface, the rate was $4.37 a month in 2019, but it was at $8.54 a month this year — an increase of about 95%. Much of that rise came in 2021, when stormwater rates rose 50% in just a single year. That was proposed because the city’s fee was relatively low and because the city needed to fund more stormwater infrastructure projects, as the Journal-World reported.

As for solid waste, the exact rate varies significantly based on what size of cart you have and whether you’re a commercial or residential customer. The Journal-World looked at the rate for a residential customer with a 65-gallon cart. The rate on the city’s website was $18.80 a month in 2019 and $22.76 a month in 2025, or a 21% increase.

As the Journal-World reported, Lawrence city commissioners in September approved year-over-year increases of 7.9% to the city’s water and wastewater rates over the next three years, and on Tuesday they were set to vote on increases in stormwater and solid waste rates, as well. The solid waste rate increase suggested by city staff would be 5.5% year-over-year for residential customers and between 3% and 9.5% for commercial customers.

Stormwater is a bit more complicated, because the city is changing its definition of an ERU. But the city has calculated that on a per-square-foot basis, the stormwater rate will increase about 6% from the 2025 rate. Based on the changes, some residents may actually see their costs for stormwater stay the same or even decrease.