Mike Boehm, Lenexa’s longest-serving mayor, will not run once more
Lenexa Mayor Mike Boehm says he is not going to search a sixth time period, wrapping up a 20-year tenure main the town. Photograph credit score Leah Wankum.
Mike Boehm, Lenexa’s longest-serving mayor, says he is not going to run for a sixth time period later this yr.
Throughout his 20 years main the town, Boehm oversaw fast development and alter in Lenexa, significantly the institution of a brand new and centralized “downtown” space at Lenexa Metropolis Heart close to I-435 and West 87th Avenue Parkway.
In a current interview with the Submit, Boehm stated the town’s improvement over the previous twenty years hinged much less upon his management and extra on group help, glorious metropolis employees and a forward-thinking imaginative and prescient.
“I believe mission achieved on the issues that had been the impetus to maintain me round for another time period,” Boehm stated. “We’re a household, and this group treats one another that manner. We’re in nice fingers.”
Boehm will end his last time period in December
After eight years on the town council, Boehm first took the mayor’s seat in January 2003 in an appointed place and subsequently ran for reelection unopposed 5 instances.
Metropolis Supervisor Beccy Yocham stated Boehm’s legacy can be “doing the suitable factor for the suitable causes and caring together with his entire coronary heart about ensuring that we’re doing the suitable factor with the tax {dollars} that we’re entrusted with.”
His last council assembly can be Dec. 5.
As of Tuesday, nobody had filed to run for mayor in November.
Lenexa’s inhabitants boomed throughout Boehm’s tenure
Boehm wouldn’t decide one specific metropolis undertaking or milestone as his proudest accomplishment however stated the town had a unified objective to serve the group as its inhabitants grew over the previous twenty years.
U.S. Census knowledge reveals Lenexa’s inhabitants grew by almost 50% between 2000 and 2020, leaping from about 40,000 to greater than 58,000 in that point.
“We wish to deal with our residents, present nice providers, and do enterprise, and never be road-blocking every thing that was distinctive or totally different,” Boehm stated.
Lenexa Metropolis Corridor on the civic campus at Lenexa Metropolis Heart, which was unveiled in 2017. File picture.
He famous a number of accomplishments
Boehm stated citizen help in addition to steady management over the previous three many years — courting again to earlier than he was mayor — has allowed Lenexa to, amongst different issues:
construct Lenexa Metropolis Heart and set up a brand new civic campus there,
revamp historic Previous City Lenexa with new streets, sidewalks, sewers and streetlights,
renovate the close by group and senior facilities,
begin the town’s farmers market,
start work on a brand new headquarters for the town police division and municipal court docket,
construct out Prairie Star Parkway and Ridgeview Street,
and create Mize Lake and the Lake Lenexa dam and spillway.
A last thought
Throughout his time as mayor, Boehm stated he tried to set expectations for a way the town council, employees and group ought to conduct enterprise — with mutual respect and open dialogue.
“Thanks for trusting us to be good stewards of [your] {dollars} and make investments the place we have to,” Boehm stated. “Citizen enter has been necessary, and we’ve tried to worth that and hear. There have been many subjects… through the years the place course of, endurance, studying, understanding, sharing, bought (us) to an amazing place and final result.”
