In a recent interview with the Post, Boehm said the city’s development over the past two decades hinged less upon his leadership and more on community support, excellent city staff and a forward-thinking vision. 

“I think mission accomplished on the things that were the impetus to keep me around for one more term,” Boehm said. “We’re a family, and this organization treats each other that way. We’re in great hands.”

Boehm will finish his final term in December

• After eight years on the city council, Boehm first took the mayor’s seat in January 2003 in an appointed position and subsequently ran for reelection unopposed five times. 
• City Manager Beccy Yocham said Boehm’s legacy will be “doing the right thing for the right reasons and caring with his whole heart about making sure that we are doing the right thing with the tax dollars that we’re entrusted with.” 
• His final council meeting will be Dec. 5.
• As of Tuesday, no one had filed to run for mayor in November. 

Lenexa’s population boomed during Boehm’s tenure

• Boehm wouldn’t pick one particular city project or milestone as his proudest accomplishment but said the city had a unified purpose to serve the community as its population grew over the past two decades.
• U.S. Census data shows Lenexa’s population grew by nearly 50% between 2000 and 2020, jumping from about 40,000 to more than 58,000 in that time.
• “We want to take care of our citizens, provide great services, and do business, and not be road-blocking everything that was unique or different,” Boehm said.

He noted several accomplishments

Boehm said citizen support as well as stable leadership over the past three decades — dating back to before he was mayor — has allowed Lenexa to, among other things:

• build Lenexa City Center and establish a new civic campus there,
• revamp historic Old Town Lenexa with new streets, sidewalks, sewers and streetlights,
• renovate the nearby community and senior centers,
• start the city’s farmers market,
• begin work on a new headquarters for the city police department and municipal court,
• build out Prairie Star Parkway and Ridgeview Road,
• and create Mize Lake and the Lake Lenexa dam and spillway.

A final thought

During his time as mayor, Boehm said he tried to set expectations for how the city council, staff and community should conduct business — with mutual respect and open dialogue.

“Thank you for trusting us to be good stewards of [your] dollars and invest where we need to,” Boehm said. “Citizen input has been important, and we’ve tried to value that and listen. There have been many topics… over the years where process, patience, learning, understanding, sharing, got (us) to a great place and outcome.”

Go deeper: Lenexa Mayor Michael Boehm will seek fifth term in office