photo by: Journal-World

The west side of the Douglas County Courthouse, 1100 Massachusetts St.

Douglas County commissioners on Wednesday will hear an update on how local advocates and agencies are helping renters who face eviction.

The commission will hear from several organizations working on eviction prevention and diversion initiatives, including the Douglas County District Court Self-Help Center, Kansas Holistic Defenders and Kansas Legal Services. All of these agencies have helped provide tenants with either legal representation during an eviction process or help with representing themselves in court.

Kansas Holistic Defenders broke down its legal defense services for tenants in a report provided to the County Commission ahead of Wednesday’s meeting. It said it had 79 cases in Douglas County where it provided full representation to a tenant and the outcome of the case was recorded. In 59 of those cases, the matter was “dismissed or decided substantially in favor of the tenant,” the report said.

Kansas Legal Services staffs the Self-Help Center once a week — on Thursdays from 9 a.m. to noon and 1:30 to 4 p.m. — to help people facing eviction and a variety of other legal matters, such as expungement, divorce and other domestic issues. Between November 2024 and April 2025, Kansas Legal Services provided help to 11 households facing eviction through the Self-Help Center. Of these, nine were seeking advice or assistance with representing themselves, and two were full representations.

A representative of Lawrence-Douglas County Public Health will also be on hand at Wednesday’s discussion. The health department has been working together with the Johnson County Department of Health and Environment to study renter protection efforts, and it provided a report to the commission ahead of Wednesday’s meeting.

Some initiatives noted in the report are already in place in Douglas County, such as an “eviction diversion” pilot initiative by the National Center for State Courts, which the report said reduced eviction filings in Douglas County by 12% in 2024.

The report also mentioned rental and utility assistance, which is available through the Self-Help Center and the Housing Stabilization Collaborative. Households are selected to receive help via a lottery system; to apply, you must be at immediate risk of eviction or having your utilities shut off.

But the report also covered programs that don’t exist yet in Douglas County, such as a mediation program that would offer an alternative to court proceedings for tenants and landlords. While Douglas County does not have such a program, Johnson County does, and it has reduced eviction judgments in Johnson County by 72%, the report said.

Another proposal in the report is guaranteeing legal representation for tenants facing eviction. Kansas City, Missouri, has had a tenant right to counsel program for several years, and the report said that out of 2,042 cases that received legal representation there, 82% of them were resolved without an eviction ruling.

One local advocacy group, called Lawrence Tenants, has launched a campaign to push for a right to counsel program in Douglas County. On social media, this group invited its members to come to the commission’s meeting on Wednesday and speak about the issue during the meeting’s public comment period.

The commission will not take any action Wednesday on the eviction prevention update, which will take place in a work session before the commission’s regular business meeting. There were no consent or regular agenda items on the agenda as of Tuesday afternoon.

The County Commission’s work session will begin at 4 p.m. on Wednesday in the Douglas County Commission meeting room at 1100 Massachusetts St. The business meeting will follow at 5:30 p.m. The meeting will also be available via Zoom.