Why He’s Running

The safety and health of residents must always be something that goes without compromise, and I’ve made sure to reach out and talk with as many different individuals and opinions as I can over the last few months, including residents (both current and previous), staff, and City Council.

My overall takeaway is this: the public safety program can work, and, like any newly implemented program, we have areas where we need to continue to improve it.

That being said, we also have some trust rebuilding to do.

I have heard some genuine concerns and questions from residents regarding the program, how it was implemented, and wondering about certain issues like training requirements and officer proficiency. In most conversations I feel residents are looking for information to feel confident about their safety, especially given the amount of confusing information that had been put out over the last few years given how politicized the public safety conversation became.

Safety is never something to take lightly, and we need to be able to show that the public safety model is providing the level of protection that residents expect. I believe it can, but I also believe that we need to be quantify that to assure residents.

Ultimately, I believe that success comes from hiring good people, building a culture that encourages the best, and making sure that we are providing the best possible fire, police, and ambulance services possible to our residents.

And over the last few months I’ve had the chance to talk with our Public Safety leadership and field staff, as well as sit in on the public interviews for the new Fire Chief John Zolondek. One thing I don’t doubt is the dedication and work ethic of the staff that we have in place. There is always room for improvement, but excellence doesn’t happen overnight. We’ve adopted the model we have, and I believe we need to commit to it, have the accountability in place to continue measuring and improving it, and make it a model for one of the best safety programs in the Country.

I'm registered independent, with strong support from people in both parties. I'm more interested in problem solving than playing politics, and I don't feel that's where our parties are at nowadays.

Every dollar we budget through the City is one less dollar residents have to support their families, pay for their homes, food, gas, and spend money at our businesses. We need accountable and efficient governance, and as a candidate I commit I will make sure we are budgeting and spending every dollar as effectively as possible for our residents.

For Cedar Falls, our City staff have done a great job of managing our budget. Yes, there have been instances of overbudget projects that we need to continue to be accountable for, and we need to prioritize getting multiple bids on projects whenever possible so that we make sure we’re getting the best pricing possible. But Cedar Falls continues to win awards and recognition for the quality of our cost controls and budgeting practices. That is one of the reasons we have the 5th lowest tax rate of the 20 largest cities in Iowa, we have the best municipal bond rating possible (think credit score but for a City), and we have very, very little debt to our name compared to other communities.

Due to limited housing availability, however, our property values are continuing to rise faster than our neighboring communities. So while we have done well to keep our tax rate down, our increasing property values are still a concern for many residents as it impacts their overall taxes paid. So addressing our housing availability and affordability needs to be a key focus for us over the coming years to help reduce the increasing property tax burden for residents, especially those who are on a fixed income.

We also need to focus on our business & industry attraction to help share the tax burden on residents. Cedar Falls’s property tax burden is currently heavily weighted on residents, at 76% vs 24% on industry, and we need to work on shifting that closer toward 50/50 through business attraction & expansion initiatives.

We’ve gone back and forth several times on how to address parking in downtown, and it is leaving residents confused and wondering what the plan is. Downtown parking is one of the main issues limiting downtown, and we need solutions.

First, we need to simplify the current parking zones in downtown, and improve enforcement to be more user-friendly to residents and visitors trying to patron and support downtown.

Secondly, the question comes up often about whether or not we’re going to build a parking ramp downtown. I would answer this question with another question: is our plan to continue growing and attracting people to live in and visit our downtown? If the answer is yes (which I believe it is), then we are going to need a parking ramp.

But a parking ramp is a major expense, and it needs to be planned as part of an intentional, long-term vision for downtown that we should be working toward now. Done well, a parking ramp isn’t just about parking. A multi-use parking ramp does a few key things:

1. It provides a more appropriate place to park for people who need to park in downtown for extended periods of time, including downtown residents, employees, and visitors coming to stay for extended periods of time, i.e. for large events like Sturgis Falls or to come use the new Cedar River whitewater course that starts construction this fall. This opens up more streetside parking for customers and people coming downtown to eat and shop.

2. By having new developments pay a fee to lease space in the ramp for their residents or employees, it allows us to lessen the parking lot requirements on new developments in downtown. That frees up more space in downtown for stores, outdoor spaces, and generally more valuable use of the limited space in downtown rather than more parking lots.

3. If a ramp includes first floor commercial space, it adds an entirely new area of stores and experiences in downtown that aren’t currently there. An example is how the development of State Street added a whole new set of experiences to our downtown with more storefronts and the River Place Plaza for music and events.

Our downtown is one of our greatest assets, and we need to continue investing in it as an attraction and quality of life amenity for residents, families, and businesses who want to call Cedar Falls home. As well as visitors and tourists from outside the community who come to shop, dine, and spend their money in Cedar Falls.

I’m honestly not opposed to the Mayor being a part-time position. Many of our peer communities operate under a Council-Manager form of government with a full-time City Manager and a part-time Mayor, and even in Cedar Falls we’ve slowly shifted toward a hybrid form where our City Administrator has more responsibility for the day-to-day operations of the City (though he still reports directly to the Mayor and City Council).

That said, I don’t think we are ready to make that transition. Our City leadership has been too fractured, and I believe right now we need an experienced, hands-on Mayor who is willing to work with residents, staff, and City Council to rebuild a long-term vision for Cedar Falls. We have several significant economic and community development issues that we need to start addressing, and it will require a significant amount of leadership and work to follow through on them for our residents.

But if we can get Cedar Falls back on track with a long-term plan and leadership who is working together toward it, that would put us in a much better position to review the current full-time Mayor & Administrator setup, and whether or not we should transition to a Manager-Council form of government with a part-time Mayor like many of our peers.

Our trail system is one of the most valuable amenities we’ve invested in over the last 20 years. The amount of people who walk, run, bike, snowshoe, skateboard, etc on the trails is something that communities across the US are envious of.

But building the trail system (and other recreational amenities like the Cedar Falls Recreation Center and the Falls Aquatic Center) weren’t always popular ideas. It took years of planning and coordination to develop the funds, approvals, and community buy-in needed to do those projects. And we can’t take that for granted today.

We need to continue to identify ways to leverage our outdoor recreation and natural assets like the Cedar River and build on the success of past projects like the trail system. I believe the City should take a lead role in the development of these projects, leveraging both private support and state & national funding opportunities to do them. These are the types of investments that pay off in the long-run through attracting new residents, tourism dollars, and subsequently businesses to the community.

But beyond the increased tax base, these are the types of amenities that also improve physical and mental health, social interaction in the community, and an overall better quality of life for all of our residents. Quality of life is something that I believe we pride ourselves on in Cedar Falls, and it’s something I think most of us would agree is worth investing in.

This topic is a little closer to me personally. I helped to start the Black Business & Entrepreneur Accelerator program in Waterloo in partnership with UNI and 24/7 BLAC, and I've worked with a lot of the immigrant and refugee community in Waterloo/Cedar Falls over the last 10 years as well. There is definitely still a perception that Cedar Falls isn't an accepting place for people who don't fit a specific box, and having grown up here I hate that that is still a reality for us to address.

A lot of my work has been helping to address the root causes of socio-economic disparities in issues like home ownership and generational wealth, business startup rates, and barriers to employment, and I'd like to see us do a better job of showing that Cedar Falls is working toward the economic inclusion of all our residents and potential residents. Some of these topics, like employment rates and home ownership, are more substantial and will take decades to truly address, but there are also small things that we can be more aware of in the short term.

One example being that in the newly remodeled City Hall, there is a wall that shows the history of Cedar Falls going back to the 1800's. Unfortunately the history starts once Cedar Falls was founded by Sturgis and doesn't recognize any of the Native American history prior to that. A lot of us who don't have Native American heritage may not notice it, but I can guarantee that those that do notice it.

Sometimes it’s the little, intentional details that can matter most, and we need to do a better job of viewing Cedar Falls through the lens of a more diverse population of residents (including ethnicity but also age, ability, etc) if we hope to continue being a place that many people feel comfortable calling home.

I believe government service is a responsibility. It’s a responsibility to serve the needs of citizens, and that means being forthright and transparent with our decision making, conflicts of interest, our communications, and our progress on key goals.

A few things I’d like to implement to implement to improve transparency and accountability for residents:

1. Reviewing the decision to allow City Council members to use their personal emails rather than their City provided emails. I believe City provided emails provide better transparency for open record laws and reporting.

2. More strictly abide by the conflict of interest requirements for both the Mayor and City Council members. And ensure that any potential conflicts of interest are reported and/or made aware of during key votes.

3. Begin holding quarterly 1-day work sessions with City leadership and Council members to review progress for the last quarter, review our priorities for the coming quarter, and provide residents a regular update on progress toward key annual goals.

Whether or not our actions at the local level have a large impact on the overall climate, we need to be designing our city and our practices to minimize our adverse environmental impact and be more prepared to sustain adverse climate scenarios like drought or increased flooding.

I also do believe that more sustainable practices like bioswales and permeable concrete can help reduce our long-term infrastructure maintenance costs. That said, it isn't always feasible to do the most environmentally friendly practice in every instance, but I think we need to be intentional in reviewing when it is appropriate.

Our natural environment (water table, river, greenspaces, etc) are some of the most valuable assets we have as a community, and we can't take them for granted.

Growth can be a loaded word these days. Managed poorly, growth and new development can burden the city and residents with increasing infrastructure costs and property taxes. But I think most people would agree that we want SOME growth - we just want to be sure it’s done intentionally and intelligently.

When it comes to growth, I am a strong proponent of in-fill development rather than continually pushing to expand at the edge of town. In-fill development is less expensive to maintain in the long-run vs building out new infrastructure at the city edges, and it also encourages stronger neighborhoods within town. This can help us grow responsibility using the space that we have, allowing us to keep property taxes as low as possible and also preserve our more rural, secluded acreage type living that many people in Cedar Falls appreciate.

Something to note: we do need to do a better job of working with developers and existing nearby neighborhoods to ensure new developments are an appreciated addition to the area and also don’t cause any harm to the existing neighborhood areas through stormwater run-off or drainage during construction. I would like to see better communication with residents during new development proposals and the construction process, as well as improved coordination with developers through the construction process.