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Lawrence board weighs new waste-diversion KPI as Burns & McDonnell begins master plan
Summary
The Environmental Sustainability Advisory Board discussed a proposed KPI to track percent of municipal solid waste recycled or composted, heard that Burns & McDonnell was contracted for a city solid-waste master plan, and reviewed how the metric would be measured and tied to the 2026 budget and a parallel Douglas County plan required by KDHE.
The Lawrence Environmental Sustainability Advisory Board on Thursday debated a proposed key performance indicator to measure “percent of municipal solid waste that is recycled or composted” and heard an update that the city commissioned Burns & McDonnell to lead a solid-waste master plan.
The measure would track communitywide municipal solid waste, not just city operations, and officials said the choice of metric will affect which programs get budget priority in 2026.
Cathy Richardson, the city sustainability director, said the proposed KPI grew from recommendations of the former Sustainability Advisory Board and community input. “Percent of municipal solid waste that is recycled or composted,” she said, “is a waste reduction measure.” Richardson told the board Burns & McDonnell has been selected to lead a consultant-driven solid-waste master plan that will examine diversion strategies including residential and commercial recycling expansion and food-waste collection pilots.
Why it matters: the city’s strategic-plan KPIs inform budget decisions and any KPI the board prioritizes is more likely to receive staff time and money. Richardson said the timeline for the city master plan runs through 2026 and that solid-waste work also ties into a county-level solid-waste management plan that is required by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment (KDHE).
Board members dug into technical questions about how the KPI would be measured. Richardson explained the city would use tonnage recorded on vehicle scales at transfer and processing facilities and that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and peer cities use a similar approach. She told members that household-level composting is difficult to include consistently under EPA diversion calculations: “Municipal solid waste doesn’t mean the city of Lawrence operations solid waste,” she said, adding that EPA guidance excludes construction, demolition and some industrial wastes from MSW diversion calculations.
Board members proposed alternatives and clarifications, including using a per-capita landfill tonnage measure and specifying whether the KPI should reflect prevention as well as diversion. One member suggested simpler metrics — total tons to landfill or pounds per person per day — so policy options would not be constrained by percentage calculations.
Richardson also discussed operational details: the city’s material recovery facility contract is with Hamway Services, and the city has previously experienced short-term storage of hard-to-market plastics when residual markets tightened. She said the solid-waste master plan will address collection efficiency, commercial recycling expansion, food-waste diversion pilots and how to account for diversion in community-level metrics.
Public comment: Dawn, who identified herself as part of a community group opposing a nearby development, asked that her group, which she called Save the Wakariza River Valley ("swerve"), be allowed to present to the board. The board agreed to consider presentation requests under a pending process (see separate article on presentation policy).
Ending: Richardson asked board members to provide suggested KPI wording and to recommend communities or resources already tracking waste-minimization metrics. She said staff will coordinate community engagement as part of the consultant-led plan and that some budget for the master-plan work is already included in the solid-waste enterprise fund.
