Memorandum

City of Lawrence

City Manager’s Office/Human Resources Division

TO:	Thomas M. Markus, City Manager
CC:	Casey Toomay, Assistant City Manager
FROM:	Lori Carnahan, Human Resources Manager
DATE:	December 13, 2018
RE:	Residency Requirements for City Employees

Summary

At a recent meeting of the City Commission, a request was made for information about residency requirements for City employees. Staff has reviewed historical documents, policies in our market cities, and some academic research on this issue. It shows that while the City of Lawrence has not required employees (outside of a designated group of executive staff) to live within the City of Lawrence since at least 1995, more than 60% of current employees do live within the City. It also shows that residency requirements vary among our market cities. Most require their chief executive to live with the City limits, few have the requirement for all employees. Finally, research shows that while there are perceived benefits to these requirements, residency requirements can also be a barrier to hiring the most qualified candidates.

Background

Residency requirements are addressed in both the City Code and the City’s Employee Handbook.

Handbook. The 1975 employee handbook indicated that “Municipal employees are encouraged but not required to reside within the legal boundaries of the City of Lawrence, Kansas.” With the exception that police and fire personnel were required to reside within the legal boundaries. The 1987 employee handbook required full time regular employees to reside within the boundaries established by the City Commission. The 1995 handbook was silent on residency and has been ever since.

City Code. City Code seemed to dictate residency beginning in 1979. The City Commission established boundaries in 1979 (Code 1979, 1-305), reaffirmed in the published code for 1988 and 1990 as “All employees of the city shall establish and maintain their permanent residence within or immediately adjacent to an area bounded on the north by the Douglas county line, on the east by Douglas County Road Number 1061, on the south United States Highway Number 56, and on the west by Douglas County Road Number 1029, except that no employee shall reside within the corporate limits of any municipality other than the city [of Lawrence]”.

The City Commission modified residency requirements in Ordinance 6267 appearing in the 1994 city code as “The following City employees are hereby required to establish and maintain a permanent residence within the incorporated boundaries of the City of Lawrence, Kansas: City Manager, Chief of Police, Director of Public Works, Director of Administrative Service/City Clerk, Fire Chief, Director of Community Development, Director of Finance/City Treasurer, Director of Human Relations/Human Resources, Director of Parks and Recreation, Director of Planning, and Director of Utilities. The Commission most recently revised this list of employees required to live within the Lawrence city limits in 2018 via Ordnance 9486, which is provided below.

Current City of Lawrence Residency Requirements

Currently, certain City Staff at the executive level are required to live within the city limits as directed by City Code Article 1- 405.

RESIDENCY REQUIREMENTS FOR CERTAIN CITY EMPLOYEES. (Ord. 9486)

(A) The following City employees are hereby required to establish and maintain a permanent residence within the incorporated boundaries of the City of Lawrence, Kansas for the positions of: City Manager, Assistant City Manager(s) and all department directors, including, but not limited to the CODE OF THE CITY OF LAWRENCE, KANSAS 1-9 following positions: Chief of the Lawrence Police Department, Director of the Municipal Services and Operations Department, Chief of the Lawrence Douglas County Fire Medical Department, Director of Finance, Director of Information Technology, Director of Parks and Recreation, Director of the City Attorney’s Office, and the Director of Planning and Development Services.

(B) Employees as described in subsection (A) of this section who are not already residents of the City of Lawrence at the inception of their employment with the City shall have a period of six (6) months after such employment begins within which to establish residence within the City, after the end of such six (6) months period their exemption from the requirements of this Section shall terminate.

(C) Violation of any of the provisions of this Section shall result in discharge from employment with the City. (Ord. 6267, Ord. 9486)

No other employees have such a requirement. Departments are allowed to establish call back response times for those who are placed “on call”, other than that individual departments cannot establish a residency requirement.

Residence of Current City Staff

Over 70% of employees in any level of breakdown live in Douglas County with the majority also within the City of Lawrence city limits. Below are three charts that illustrate the current residency of city staff. The residence of employees is that recorded in the City’s payroll records effective December 1, 2018.

All employees include all full time regular, part time regular, Fire Medical extraboard, full time temporary and part time temporary (sometimes referred to as seasonal).

Benefited employees is all full time regular and part time regular staff.

The Management Level include everyone at a division level manager and above.

Market Residency Requirements

The Human Resources office regularly uses a group of six cities/agencies for comparison purposes. They are Cities of Lenexa, Olathe, Overland Park, Shawnee, Topeka and the Unified Government of Wyandotte County/Kansas City, KS. Of the five respondents, only one requires all employees to reside within the city limits and it also the only agency to require residency below the department director level. One agency required residency within the county at all levels. All indicate that residency must be required if required by state statute. All require the City Manager/Administrator to reside within the city limits. There is varying direction for department heads.

Municipal Residency Requirement Laws and Their Impact on Cities

The best reference and the only discussion that pointed to research rather than opinion is a study completed by Christina Plerhoples, Michigan State University in April 2013 titled Municipal Residency Requirement Laws and Their Impact on Cities in which she constructed a unique data set on municipal residency laws for 73 of the largest 100 cities from 1970 through 2006. She indicated that to her knowledge, this is the first panel data set of these laws. Her conclusion is as follows:

“My results show that the implementation of a residency law may actually have a positive effect on crime, no effect on fiscal health, and no clear effect on city demographics. The removal of a residency law is associated with a reduction in crime, no clear effect on fiscal health, and no reduction in population. These results tend to refute the public coffer theory and the efficiency and quality of service provision theories. They also refute the theory that residency requirements improve the overall population and demographics of a city.

It is clear that residency requirements laws do not remedy cities of high crime rates, fiscal stress and demographic ills. In addition, removing a residency law does not cause mass exodus from the city. The negative effects of reducing the pool of workers within a city and pushing out the best employees has a stronger effect on city outcomes than do the proposed benefits of a residency law. Residency laws are simply a barrier to hiring the most qualified employees.”

Conclusion

Over half of all city employees choose to live within the city limits of Lawrence without any requirement to do so. This shows a positive deference to living and participating in our community. 70% live within our county. The only study that researches whether compelling employees to reside within a city indicates that residency requirements are “simply a barrier to hiring the most qualified employees” and hold no economic, service or population benefit. This tells me that regardless of opinion or theory for which one may prescribe, it is not in the best interests of the community or this organization to require employees to live within the city limits. In fact, it might become a hindrance to hiring the most qualified staff.