Tag: Iowa

#89: Sheldon, IA 3/1/17

It was an exciting day in Northwest Iowa: the city of Sheldon was expecting!

No, not a newborn. Rather, a fully-grown library director.

“We are successful?” Mayor Katricia Meendering inquired with a coffee cup poised at her lips in case a spit take was necessary.

“Yes!” a city employee blurted out enthusiastically.

“Wonderful,” said the mayor, taking a relaxed sip of joe.

“It’s taken us a little bit but we’re happy with Nicole Morgan, who we found from Oskaloosa,” the employee explained, anxiously scanning the council members for a reaction.

There were nods of approval around the room.

“Family?” the mayor quizzed offhandedly. She quickly chuckled and added, “I’m just kidding, you don’t have to answer that.”

The woman was clearly caught off-guard, but didn’t want to say no to Sheldon’s head honcho. “Oh, um, she has family in the area. She’ll be commuting for a bit.”

Okay, folks, let’s not get TOO personal. She hasn’t even started–

“Maybe she could come introduce herself at some point?” city attorney Micah Schreurs inquired hopefully.

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“Maybe you could find out what kind of flowers she likes?”

“Sure,” the staffer responded hesitantly. “We’ll…let her acclimate a little bit first.”

“Yep. Get her feet wet. Then…the first meeting in April!” Meendering barked. She immediately broke into another awkward laugh. “I’m just kidding.”

Perhaps. But if I were Nicole, I’d hold off on the unpacking until I made an appearance at city hall.

In a thrilling turn of events, the library wasn’t Sheldon’s only source of breaking news. The mayor coyly waited until the sleepy middle of the meeting to drop this bombshell on the other unsuspecting Cornhuskers: her exclusive tour of the Crossroads Pavilion.

“Wow,” she deadpanned. “If you have not had the opportunity to see the most recent updates they have done…wow. It’s absolutely breathtaking.”

This modern engineering marvel was so inspiring, there was apparently only one word to describe it.

“We were there at noon. Two, three guys [were] putting the floor down and…wow,” she murmured.

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Interior of Crossroads Pavilion

But the praise had barely died down before Council Member Pete Hamill brought up a subject that was distinctly not-wow.

“For dog and pet owners, be responsible for your pets. Just heard of two incidents in the past ten days of one person being bit by a dog,” he frowned, propping his elbow on the dais. “And then another person walking their dog being attacked by two strays.”

“Oh, my,” exclaimed the startled mayor. “I thought you were going to talk about ‘doody business’ because I’ve been getting a lot of calls on that.”

Council members silently watched her fold her arms in annoyance.

“That’s serious. I think the doody is serious too, but…” she trailed off.

Not as serious as a dog-mauling was the implication. Let’s hope the new library director isn’t watching. She might just choose to stay in bite-free Oskaloosa.

Final thoughts: Clearly the V.I.P. (Very Important Pavilion) here was Crossroads. I give it 8 out of 10 stars for the “wow” factor.

#87: Coralville, IA 2/14/17

Love was in the air at the Coralville Valentine’s Day city council meeting! It was a momentous night: the city had finally asked a new police chief to tie the knot. And he said, “I do.”

“A very prestigious, memorable item on our agenda,” Mayor John Lundell flashed a big grin. “I would start by entertaining a motion to approve the appointment of Shane Kron as our police chief.”

The council members were so giddy, they trampled over each other to agree. “So moved!” a couple of them shouted out.

Mayor Lundell chuckled. “We have an outstanding police department in Coralville. Our outgoing chief, Barry Bedford–he’s been part of the department for 43 years. But also, 16 of those years, Shane Kron was a member of the department.”

City administrator Kelly Hayworth gently broke in. “It’s longer than 16. I believe it’s 27.”

Realizing he was WELL outside the margin of error, the mayor blurted sheepishly, “Oh, I’m sorry!”

Your honor, take it from me: before you commit to a new beau, you should know their WHOLE relationship history!

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“Mayor, this paper just says, ‘do u like me? yes, no, maybe’.”

Also, don’t say weird things about them. Like this:

“All four candidates were cream. But the cream rose above the cream to the top. And here he is, and is our new chief,” rhapsodized Council Member Bill Hoeft in a stilted Maya-Angelou-of-the-Midwest rhythm.

After the chief was sworn in, the mayor caused a few disheartened chuckles when he announced, “now on to the exciting next item: the budget!”

Hey, hey, don’t be so facetious, mayor. There was plenty of good news for C-ville: property taxes were unchanged for the eighth consecutive year! The water plant is getting a brand new filter building! And corn has never been yellower!

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Nice chart

A man in a striped shirt and red tie sprung to the podium and signed the guest register. He had prepared a wide-ranging soliloquy about the budget, the city council, and his…um, unique hobbies.

“As always, I have reviewed the budget,” he said. “I kind of live the budget. I’m a gym rat for budgeting, if you will.”

I will. Go on.

“I would ask, how’s your own checkbook? You don’t have to answer that, but you’re dealing with your money at home and your money down here, so they should both be in pretty good shape.”

You’re losing me, citizen. I don’t think anyone’s going to whip out their checkbooks, so how about we close strong?

“Think about this: if you shower quicker, you would save yourself some money. And anytime you see someone watering their lawn, send them a thank-you card because they’ll be using all that water and spend a lot more money than you will if you shower,” he proclaimed like Columbo cracking the case.

The council members took a second to digest this insider tip.

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“Now, here’s a little trick about sewage treatment–“

“Thank you for caring” about the budget, Council Member Laurie Goodrich offered politely.

As council members gathered up their papers, the city attorney had a piece of news to share that he had evidently been sitting on for 45 minutes.

“The city attorney’s office approves the appointment of Shane. Also, I can’t help but notice that we don’t have to worry about him tearing his hair out over anything!”

Everyone let out a snicker at the shiny-domed chief. I’m sure he can look forward to maaannnnany more years of jokes like that.

#70: Lisbon, IA 11/28/16

Don’t be fooled. Lisbon’s population may be just 2,200 people–but its December calendar is packed tighter than a Tokyo subway car at rush hour.

“Holiday Jubilee proclamation,” Mayor Beryl O’Connor adjusted her eyeglasses and read the sweeping decree. “Whereas holiday celebration is an effective tool for fostering local pride and maintaining community character, I, Mayor of Lisbon, proclaim December 10, 2016 ‘Lisbon’s Holiday Jubilee’ and call upon the people of Lisbon to join their fellow citizens in participating in this special occasion.”

Harken, Lisbonites! Your leader calls upon you to spread cheerfulness maximus! (What exactly does that entail?)

“We’ll be having activities during the day starting out with breakfast with Mrs. Claus,” city administrator Connie Meier explained. “The parade lineup will start at four. This year we changed the theme to ‘Parade with Your Pets.’ So you can dress your pets up in Christmas sweaters and walk them in the parade.”

With this news, my heart grew three sizes. Granted, this is Iowa, so I imagine there will be several cows in festive XXL upperwear.

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Pictured: Director of the Lisbon Chamber of Commerce

“Next month is kind of a busy month,” warned the city administrator. “Lisbon Schools is having all of their concerts on Monday night. December 12 would be our next regular council meeting–there is an elementary K-3rd [concert] at 6:00 and [grades] 4-6 at 7:15. On December 19th, there’s also the high school band and choir concerts.”

Uh-oh. Is it time to take the missiles to DEFCON-2, Your Honor?

“Is your daughter in band or anything?” the mayor muttered to Council Member Nathan Smith.

“The 19th is out for me,” he winced. “And she’s in basketball, so Tuesday nights tend to be interrupted too.”

Thankfully, the crisis was defused: they agreed to double up the meetings on December 5.

“What’s wrong with the lights?” Mayor O’Connor spontaneously blurted out. “One side of the street comes on and five minutes later the other side of the street comes on!”

“It’s where the photo eyes are placed–” the public works director started to answer.

“I have no idea what that means,” the mayor stared blankly.

The director patiently explained this complex marvel of modern engineering. “The photo eyes are detecting the sunlight. When the sun’s coming across, it will still be shining on one photo eye and there will be enough shade on the other one that it’ll keep ’em on.”

“It’s called photo eye?” she cautiously inquired. “If I tell somebody that, they’ll think I know what I’m talking about?”

The public works director humored her. “Yep.”

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This picture was taken with a photo eye

While he had the floor, there was something else he needed to get off his chest for the good of the city:

“This it the second time in twelve months we’ve had problems with our spiral screen” at the wastewater plant. (Mayor, if you say “spiral screen” people will NOT know what you’re talking about.)

“I know everybody’s reading these wrappers, and their sanitary wipes and wet wipes are saying they can be flushed. Please, [I’m] asking people not to flush.”

He exhaled. “So yeah, that’s my little soapbox speech.”

Final thoughts: Stop flushing the wet wipes! Geez.

Interview #23: City Council Presenter Ashly Perez de Tejada (with podcast)

This podcast interview is available on iTunes, Stitcher, Player FM and right here:

Ashly Perez de Tejada is a survey specialist with the National Research Center. But, in a twist, her job is to present the survey research to city councils at their meetings. How fun! We talk about the time she was challenged by a council member and find out which city had the nicest council members.

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Q: What is your relationship to city council meetings?

A: I go to city council meetings to present findings from our citizen surveys.

Q: So if you’re not doing political polling, what kinds of things are you asking?

A: We ask various questions about people’s quality of life and certain things they enjoy or dislike about their community.

Q: Do you ever sit there in the meetings watching other people present and you think, “oh, my god…these guys are tanking! How are we supposed to follow this?”

A: [Laughs] Thankfully we’ve gotten really lucky in that a lot of our presentations are done towards the beginning. But of those we’ve had to see, I would say that we just are empathetic to the situation because I know that city council meetings can be hours and hours long. So everybody else who has to present has to go through the same challenges with respect to keeping their attention, really getting their point across, but getting the heck out of there.

Q: When you’re presenting to the city council, have you ever gotten a question to the effect of, “wait, we paid money for this?”

A: Some people are surprised when we are up there. I won’t tell you the community name, but just about everybody was on board on the city council except for one person. He basically stated that the survey was useless because he was elected and, therefore, just by process of being elected, he knew what the constituency wanted.

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Survey researcher Ashly Perez de Tejada

Q: Because you’ve sat through other parts of city council meetings, has there been anything you’ve seen that’s been enjoyable to you?

A: I think it’s just interesting when they have a lot of public comment. Initially, before working this job, I had very little understanding of what city councils actually did. I have to say that surveying is the best way to get at the entire community’s opinion and not just those that go to every single council meeting and have an opinion about every single thing on the agenda.

Q: Who do you think had the nicest city council chamber?

A: I really enjoyed going to Aurora’s [Colorado] city council. They have a really cool communication area–and it’s just for every time they want to create a commercial–and they have a really nice setup. It wasn’t so intimidating because you didn’t have to stand below everybody.

Q: Nice, nice. In what city were the council members the friendliest?

A: I would probably say Cedar Rapids.

Q: Okay, Iowa.

A: I flew out there a few months ago and everybody was very welcoming and they wanted to talk to me after the fact not just about the survey results, but just to find out how things were going and actually asked me about personal stuff.

Q: Okay, there you have it. Cedar Rapids, Iowa, coming in as a dark horse for the friendliest city council members in America!

Follow Ashly Perez de Tejada on Twitter: @barlau

#3: Muscatine, IA 4/7/16

If something smells musky, it’s gotta be the Muskies of Muscatine, Iowa! This Thursday’s city council meeting was as hot as a stick of fried butter here in the “Pearl of the Mississippi.” From an arts center imbroglio to a puzzling piece of park, these Hawkeyes stayed hawk-eyed on the People’s Business.

“Tonight we have a special guest,” mayor Diana Broderson hinted, smiling toward the podium and the local V.I.P. standing astride it. “Sophia Aguirre is going to read the proclamation done for the Muscatine Volunteer Week.”

Whoa, talk about a surprise drop-in! Mayor Broderson booked the 2016 Miss Muscatine Outstanding Teen for a primetime Thursday night appearance?!

I was starstruck as Her Highness daintily read the declaration of April 10-16 as volunteer week for all Muskies. Applause erupted among the common rabble and the council members giddily lined up for a photo of this once-in-a-lifetime brush with royalty.

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Miss Muscatine Outstanding Teen thunderously addressing her subjects

After this red carpet moment, the council turned to less glamorous fare. “We’re gonna move on to number five in our agenda,” Mayor Broderson announced. Number five? Where were numbers two through four? Had they been executed at Miss Teen Muscatine’s request?

“If there is anyone in the audience that would like to discuss an item not on tonight’s agenda, please step to the podium,” the mayor thundered.

One citizen approached warily.

The councilmembers licked their lips, ready to pounce on their foolhardy prey.

“I wanted to propose making Third Street a one-way to deal with traffic flow instead of making Second Street into a two-way,” this fair Muskie beseeched her overseers.

“I guess if…” she paused, searching for the words that would get her out of the lion’s den unscathed. “If it’s possible, we could vote on it as a referendum.”

A vote! BY THE RABBLE? I shuddered and turned away, expecting the mayor to tear into her, ripping tendon from bone.

“Thank you. We’ll talk about that further,” she said.

Ah, mercy. The mark of a benevolent lord.

“Let’s move on to section 9A,” Mayor Broderson said, clearly showing not a care in the world for her rupture in the chronological order of space-time.

Section 9A was a proclamation for Sister City Day in Muscatine. The mayor stamped the holiday on April 3, to honor Dro…Droh–“boy this is gonna be tough,” she muttered–Drohobych, Ukraine; Kisolovodsk, Russia; Ichikawamisato, Japan;  Ludw-well, you get the idea. Weird names. The council stood to take a photo with the proclamation.

“We should have all worn our Sunday best today,” the mayor mused.

“I’ll look a lot thinner behind you,” one ample-bodied councilman grunted to another, squeezing into the plus-sized and clearly corn-fed group.

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Paparazzi were out in force

Moving on to item 11–yes, 11, thanks to a power-mad mayor–the contract to repair the Muscatine Art Center. There was only one bidder, so open-and-shut case. Moving right along-

“We received one bid?” Councilman Tom Spread cried out.

“There were actually two bids for the project,” a gray-haired city bureaucrat sighed. “The lady delivering the bid for the second contractor got confused and went to the county administration building. She was 10 minutes late, so we couldn’t open that bid.”

Too bad. So sad. Leave her in the dust, boys.

“How do you vote, Tom?” the mayor asked.

“Aye,” Councilman Tom responded.

“Allen?…Bob?…Santos?…Scott?…Phil?…Mike?” All ayes.

Next up, accepting a small portion of Sevig Street for the designation-

“Where’s Sevig Street?” the baritone voice of Councilman Mike Rehwaldt boomed.

Over by the Wal-View development, the city manager called out from the front row, to the councilman’s satisfaction.

Final item, approve an updated master plan for Riverside Park. There was-

“Riverview Park? Is that…the park right opposite that small boat harbor?” Councilman Rehwaldt again interrupted. “Isn’t that Riverveiw Park?”

“Riverside Park,” Councilman Santos Saucedo corrected.

Again, the city manager to the rescue: “Riverside Park is basically Cedar Street down to the boat launch.”

Councilman Rehwaldt crossed his meaty arms, satisfied at learning two new things about his city today.

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Councilman Mike “Where is this? Do I live here?” Rehwaldt

With the councilman’s appetite thus satiated, this council of Muskie elders, like the mighty Mississippi River, faded into the night.

Final thoughts: Two words: Miss. Muscatine. Nothing could top that kind of cameo. I give this meeting 10 out of 10 tiaras.