Lawrence city commissioners on Tuesday will consider approving a revised 2025 budget proposal that would delay plans to construct two new fire stations in town, staff firetrucks with four firefighters and reduce raises for many city employees.
The budget would lower the mill levy, or property tax rate, just slightly — to 33.197 mills from 33.207. Most residents will still see their city property taxes increase. The city’s total assessed valuation has increased about 7.6% since 2024.
Commissioners previously voted 3-2 to set the maximum mill levy — or property tax rate — at 36.807, which would have been an increase of 3.6 mills over the current rate. The rate would have resulted in triple-digit property tax increases for many residents.
The revised budget includes several requests commissioners made during their last meeting.
One of those requests was to consider giving across-the-board 1% cost of living adjustments to non-union employees, rather than 2%. That would save about $200,000, staff members said at the time. Commissioner Amber Sellers suggested possibly applying lower raises only to executive-level employees, but that option does not appear to be included in the agenda for commissioners to consider.
Lawrence-Douglas County Fire Medical leaders have pushed for the past few years to build new fire stations, citing slower response times to some hotspots in the city’s outskirts as city limits have expanded. The new proposed 2025 budget would delay the start of construction of those stations by one year. The five-year capital improvement plan estimates that the stations will ultimately cost about $29.5 million, plus $5.8 million total for a firetruck for each station.
Firefighters and supporters have also showed up to ask the commission to maintain four-person staffing on each firetruck as opposed to a plan to go down to three-person staffing to cut costs. Commissioners asked that the revised budget proposal include funding for 149 total operational staff for LDCFM, and staffing each firetruck with four people.
The proposed budget includes funding for a spray park in west Lawrence, to be paid through general obligation bonds — $150,000 in 2025 and $650,000 in 2026, or $800,000 total. An estimated $700,000 renovation to the South Park wading pool was moved to unfunded projects in the CIP.
The budget would also pay for some playground replacements from the city’s special recreation fund balance, according to the meeting agenda.
The budget increases funding for police patrol and information services but decreases funds to the office of the chief, investigations and professional standards units.
The cuts would result in slower or no response to non-priority calls, possibly directing some calls to online reporting; reduced capacity to assist with child and sexual assault investigations “due to the loss of one investigator, leading to the reprioritization of resources”; decreased opportunities for community-police interaction and engagement such as the police camp, annual safety fair, trunk or treat and citizens academy; and diminished ability to respond effectively to people experiencing mental health crises, according to the city staff presentation in the meeting agenda.
Commissioners during their last meeting agreed to ask voters to consider a sales tax increase to fund homelessness services. Read more about that in this article.
The proposed budget’s fund balance for 2025 would be $22.1 million, which falls under the city’s goal of $28.6 million but is $3 million over the policy minimum of $19.1 million. The previous iteration of the budget would have increased the fund balance to $27.1 million.
City Manager Craig Owens and commissioners agreed during the Aug. 20 meeting that they will need to have longer-term talks about sustainability of the budget in the future, and include the community in those talks, starting earlier in the budget process.
“We need to create a process that lets us have those conversations, because that’s not how the budget conversations have gone in the time I’ve been here,” Owens said at the time. “… If anything is discussed about reduction of service, it is not met with conversation. And we’re just running out of money to do that.”
Tuesday’s agenda item states that “Following the adoption of the 2025 budget, staff will develop and implement a process to create a sustainable long-range budget plan. This plan will confront the reality of a high demand for existing and expanded municipal services, rising expenditures outpacing revenues and the need for structural change for long-range financial health.”
See the full proposed budget at this link.
The commission will begin its regular meeting at 5:45 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 3 at City Hall, 6 E. Sixth St. See the complete meeting agenda at this link.
Meetings are open to the public, broadcast on Midco channel 25 and livestreamed on the city’s YouTube page, youtube.com/@lawrenceksvideo.
The commission accepts written public comment until noon the day of the meeting emailed to ccagendas@lawrenceks.org. The commission also hears public comment in person during meetings as well as via Zoom. Register for Tuesday’s Zoom meeting at this link.
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Mackenzie Clark (she/her), reporter/founder of The Lawrence Times, can be reached at mclark@lawrencekstimes.com. Read more of her work for the Times here. Check out her staff bio here.
Lawrence city budget coverage
August Rudisell/Lawrence TimesRevised Lawrence city budget would delay fire station projects, keep mill levy almost flat
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