photo by: Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission screenshot

Members of the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission take part in discussion during their meeting on Monday, Dec. 18, 2023.

While serving on the Lawrence-Douglas County Planning Commission, Chelsi Hayden raised concerns with a City Hall attorney that the commission was frequently violating the Kansas Open Meetings Act as it developed controversial wind farm regulations.

After raising those concerns, Hayden was denied reappointment to the Planning Commission despite having risen to the rank of the commission’s chair, and being eligible for reappointment. Now, a pair of Douglas County commissioners are declining to say whether Hayden’s whistleblower complaints led them to oppose her reappointment to the Planning Commission.

Commissioner Patrick Kelly declined to answer any specific questions about his decision to oppose Hayden’s reappointment. Those questions from the Journal-World included one about Hayden’s complaint that the Planning Commission had violated the open meetings law by holding closed-door, ad hoc committee meetings to draft regulations guiding when and where wind farms can be built in the county.

In an emailed statement to the Journal-World, Kelly left each question unanswered and instead said he believes it is inappropriate for commissioners to speak on why they voted for or against a matter once the public meeting on the matter has concluded. Rather, he said all such questions after the fact should be presented to the chair of the County Commission.

“That approach reflects the belief that it is important to speak through the public deliberation and final action of the Commission rather than re-opening discussion of a completed decision through individual interviews,” Kelly said via email.

photo by: Josie Heimsoth/Journal-World

County Commissioner Patrick Kelly is pictured on Monday, July 13, 2026 during budget deliberations.

Kelly — who is running for re-election and is locked in a Democratic primary battle with Lawrence resident Milton Scott — was asked whether he believes his practice of not answering questions about his votes limits the ability of constituents to evaluate the job he has done as a commissioner. Kelly, who frequently declines to conduct in-person interviews with the Journal-World, has not provided an answer to that question that was emailed to him Monday morning.

As for Hayden, she is left wondering why she wasn’t reappointed to the Planning Commission. She said that despite volunteering more than three years of her time to the unpaid position, she has never received an explanation from anyone at the county about why she was not reappointed to the position. Kelly hasn’t provided her an explanation despite being the commissioner who nominated her more than three years ago to serve on the commission. Hayden served a partial unexpired term after being nominated and supported by Kelly, and then served a full term after being renominated by Kelly three years ago.

“I don’t know if it irritated people or didn’t irritate people,” Hayden said of the open meetings complaints she had lodged. “What I know is I was asking hard questions and didn’t get reappointed.”

The meeting where the County Commission passed over Hayden for reappointment — on a split vote the commission appointed Andrea Perdue — happened on May 6. Hayden spoke about the process publicly for the first time with the Journal-World last week. While Hayden said she respects the County Commission’s right to appoint whomever it sees fit to serve, she recently came to the conclusion that the public should have insight into the thinking behind key County Commission appointments.

She said the Planning Commission is particularly important at this moment as the city of Lawrence is implementing a new development code, and both the city and the county are grappling with what regulations should be put into place regarding huge data centers. The Planning Commission will play a key role in crafting any such regulations, and implementing them once approved.

“Who gets appointed to these boards to lead some of these public conversations is important,” Hayden said.

photo by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln/Craig Chandler

Chelsi Hayden.

The Journal-World also asked Douglas County Commissioner Karen Willey about why she did not support the reappointment of Hayden. Kelly and Willey were the two county commissioners who led the vetting process of Planning Commission applicants, and Kelly and Willey made appointment recommendations to the full County Commission.

Willey, by email, also declined to answer specific questions, and like Kelly, referred them to the chair of the County Commission.

“There is no entitlement to appointments and re-appointments to public boards,” Willey said in a brief email response to questions.

Hayden said on that point, she agrees. She said she has “no room” to argue that she personally has been wronged by not being reappointed to the Planning Commission. She also said she doesn’t want to “sound whiny” about the decision, but decided to go public with her concerns because she does believe it is fair for voters to evaluate the job that commissioners do in appointing people to key county boards. If commissioners don’t provide reasons for why they choose not to reappoint a member — especially when directly asked — the public is being deprived of information it could use to evaluate county commissioners.

“It leaves me disappointed that they wouldn’t provide an answer so that we can evaluate their decisions of who they are putting into these roles to have these important conversations,” Hayden said.

Scott — Kelly’s opponent in the Aug. 4 Democratic primary — told the Journal-World on Monday that he doesn’t support Kelly’s decision to remain silent about the matter.

“The Planning Commission, I think, is one of the most important appointments a commissioner can make,” Scott said in an interview. “I think we should be able to tell individuals why we would support or would not support a person.”

Scott said he would not take the approach of Kelly, in referring such questions to the chair of the County Commission.

“The bigger thing with me is this is why we need change with the commission because of the fact of public trust, the secrecy and not providing detailed information,” Scott said.

As for the concerns Hayden raised about the Planning Commission violating the Kansas Open Meetings Act, those were related to an “ad hoc” subcommittee of the Planning Commission that was being used to draft regulations to govern future wind farms in the county. The Douglas County Commission ultimately approved those regulations in 2024.

Hayden, a law professor at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, argued the city and county had a legal obligation under the state’s open meeting laws to publicize those meetings so that any member of the public could choose to attend. She said such publication wasn’t happening, and she made complaints about the lack of notice to a City Hall attorney. She said she believes that complaint sparked some disagreement among a city and a county attorney over what was required under the open meetings law.

The issue of subcommittees of public boards ended up becoming a statewide issue. In 2025, the Kansas Legislature passed a revision to the open meetings act removing any ambiguity about whether such subcommittee meetings must be public. The new law clearly calls for the subcommittee meetings to be open, public meetings.

Hayden’s time on the Planning Commission also was unique for a couple of other reasons. Hayden serves as the clerk for the Grant Township Board of Trustees. Grant Township currently is suing the Douglas County Commission over its approval of a permit for the Kansas Sky Energy Center project, a massive solar farm proposed for farmland in Grant Township. Hayden — who became township clerk after voters wrote her name in for the position — said she recused herself from the township’s decision to sue the county, given that she was a planning commissioner who had participated in a Planning Commission hearing for the solar farm permit.

Also, Hayden’s “significant other” is Scott Thellman Jr., a Grant Township farmer and business owner who also is a plaintiff in the lawsuit against the county.

Hayden said if the three commissioners who did not support her renomination — Kelly, Willey and Shannon Reid voted to appoint a different individual, while Commissioners Erica Anderson and Gene Dorsey voiced support for Hayden — had a problem with her Grant Township and Thellman connections, she wishes they would just say so. She said she would accept that explanation, and let members of the public decide whether it was a good reason that she not be reappointed.

Ultimately, she said commissioners were sending a poor message to county volunteers by providing no feedback about why a member eligible and willing to serve again is denied another term. She noted the Planning Commission is a time-intensive volunteer commitment, with meetings often lasting more than three hours at a time, and meeting materials often numbering more than a hundred pages.

“I understand that it is their decision and respect the process that allows them to make that decision,” Hayden said. “I would have liked to have been treated with a bit more respect.”