City Budget Analysis:

Capital Investments, Debt, and Budget Deficit

The City of Lawrence is facing a $6.5 million deficit next year. In February, they asked our community for input about how to solve this problem. The City gave us the options of reducing budgets for departments, such as police and parks and recreation, or increasing taxes. 

We greatly appreciate the City’s effort to involve the community in this important community decision-making process. Unfortunately we do not believe the City’s budget engagement process fulfilled their Strategic Plan commitments to practice collaborative engagement with our community and to provide transparent access to data. 

The City’s community engagement only allowed participants to provide input about the budget through a program that made them solve the complicated puzzle of eliminating the deficit by making 49 funding decisions. 

Additionally, the City’s budget engagement opportunities addressed only 24% of the City’s total budget. Residents did not receive information about the expenses that made up 45% of the 2025 budget – capital investments and debt payments. 

The City’s capital investments (large, one-time investments) have increased significantly in the last two years. This year, they are expected to be $152 million, which is 4.5 times as expensive as they were in 2023. 

The City’s debt payments for the last two years have been 25-30% greater than their previous highs, and these are paid with portions of our community’s property taxes, sales taxes, and utility fees. 

As of April 2025, our City has a total debt of $462.7m, which is a 19% increase from just last April. This means the City is currently carrying $4,810 of debt for each Lawrence resident, which equals $19,240 of debt for an average household of four.

For more details about the City budget, please read our full analysis of the City’s capital expenses, debt, and budget deficit. 

We offer this research to increase budget transparency. We believe this information will help our community better understand the City’s financial situation and be able to provide informed feedback to our City government. 

Community Engagement about the City Budget and Capital Expenses

The Coalition for Collaborative Governance is a non-partisan group of engaged residents who are advocating for the City to actively involve the community in its decision-making processes and to provide more transparency about City information. 

Due to the limited scope of the City’s budget engagement offerings, our coalition asked the City to host community engagement events regarding the 45% of the City’s budget that includes capital expenses and debt service. The City considerately replied that they will post answers to some of our coalition’s questions on their website, but they reported that their staff does not have the capacity to host community engagement events at this time. 

Because we believe our community would benefit from more public discussions about these important issues, our coalition will independently host A Community Conversation about the Lawrence City Budget.

Please join us on Thursday, June 5 from 6:00 to 7:30 at the Lawrence Public Library auditorium for an educational presentation and community discussion about the City’s budget, debt, and capital investments. We will compile participants’ feedback and present it to the City.