photo author: Silas May/Journal-World
Members of the public watch a meeting of the Environmental Sustainability Advisory Council at City Hall on Thursday, July 23, 2026.
As Lawrence’s new strategic plan is developed in the coming months, the Environmental Sustainability Advisory Council wants to make sure its vision is green.
The council met Thursday night to further discuss what environmental policies and projects it should recommend to the City Commission, and members said that while they should make policy recommendations in the near future, they should also think ahead to the strategic planning process that will soon begin in earnest.
“I think it’s really important to do this in two phases,” said board chair Nancy Muma. “We have some priorities that we’re putting forward now that we’re really engaging with in the strategic plan…we’re confident that we can put environmental sustainability at the core of a lot of the goals, plans and (performance indicators).”
A strategic plan is a document that, among other things, sets a city’s goals and determines how it will measure progress toward achieving them. The previous five-year strategic plan did include environmental sustainability as one of the city’s commitments, sustainability director Kathy Richardson told the board.
But board member Patrick Ross said he has seen a “lack of oversight and concern for the environment” in other parts of city government, and that he wants a stronger sustainability framework for the city. As part of this work, he compiled a 460-page Compendium of Environmental Policies and Initiatives ahead of the meeting.
“The city is going to be going through a strategic plan restructuring with a new commission here in September, so that will certainly be about how we collectively rework our strategic plan as a city,” Ross said.
The document, on which the council has taken no formal action, includes city policy proposals ranging from an environmental data dashboard to a new noxious weed and native plant ordinance to installing more solar panels on city buildings. But it also includes ideas that Lawrence could champion at the state and federal level, such as a new regional passenger rail service between Topeka, Lawrence and Kansas City, as well as long-term goals that could span decades, such as making Lawrence “energy positive”: a community that produces more clean energy than it consumes.
Ross said he was inspired by a conversation he had with Mayor Brad Finkelday at a meeting in March. At the time, Finkelday told the board that city officials would appreciate a list of environmental policy ideas rather than presenting them with “one good idea” at a time.
“When he asked, ‘What can we do?’ I tried my best to create a list from this collection of ideas,” Ross said.
Many of these ideas will be linked to the strategic plan. One of these is a “state of the environment” report, which the compilation says will be “an annual benchmark for assessing progress” in achieving the environmental goals of the strategic plan. This would be an environmental report that would be presented to the board and city and county commissions each year, and could include data on things like pollution and per capita energy consumption.
“Patrick, you have a really great overall plan that you’ve started to put together that will be a great starting point for our discussion as we develop the strategic plan,” Muma said.
However, she also wanted to focus on some shorter-term goals. The board has discussed several of them over the last couple of months, including a Styrofoam ban, a no-idling ordinance and changes to the city’s weed control regulations, but has yet to bring any of them to the city commission level.
Board member Joe Fearn wanted ideas that “don’t require a lot of support from other people,” such as a campaign to educate the public about proper recycling. “I’m a big person who wants immediate action and results,” he said.
Last month, the board asked members of the public to come to this month’s meeting and share what they thought should be the top priorities. On Thursday, about a dozen people spoke with the board on issues such as the weed control ordinance; using native plants in urban landscaping instead of monoculture lawns; additional safety measures for cyclists, including possible reduction of speed limits on residential streets; and renewable energy infrastructure.
One commenter told of a friend who was cited for a weed control violation because of plants she grew in her yard for food or medicine. Another said there should be a “structured citywide prairie restoration program.”
“I think the weed control ordinance and ending monoculture have really succeeded,” Muma said in comments. And board member Josh Roundy said solar energy and transportation are two other topics he thinks have received a lot of support.
The commission will continue to work on immediate recommendations at its next meeting. And the strategic planning process, which will involve new city manager Majed Al-Ghafri, will take place throughout the second half of the year. Richardson said a community survey will be conducted in August to help shape the plan, and that the goal is for the city to adopt a strategic plan by the end of the year.