Complete results from Tuesday’s election in Floyd County

2019 Election results

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

On Tuesday, 2,653 Floyd County voters selected members of their local city governments and school boards.

Most incumbents who were seeking re-election received it, with a couple of notable exceptions.

In Charles City, incumbent school board director Robin Macomber, the current board president, lost her position when two retired educators, Janiece Bergland and Patricia Rottinghaus, captured the two available seats.

In Marble Rock, voters declined to give incumbent John Marzen another term, instead electing incumbent Chad Schriever and newcomer Kaylah Schweizer to the two available seats.

Voters easily approved a hospital reorganization question county-wide, overwhelmingly passed a statement on how to spend state sales tax revenue in the Charles City School District, but soundly turned down a question in Rockford on who should run the local electrical utility.

In the Charles City School District, the question on the revenue purpose statement regarding how the district could spend state SAVE (Secure an Advanced Vision for Education) funds, also known as the state penny sale tax fund, passed by a huge 78% to 22% margin.

The measure was a mostly routine requirement passed by the state along with renewing the SAVE funding through the end of the year 2050. SAVE funds are used for school infrastructure or for local property tax relief.

Voters in Rockford solidly turned down a question of taking away management of the Rockford Municipal Light Plant from a board of trustees and giving control instead to the City Council. Rockford voters came out 60% against and 40% for the question of changing.

In Colwell, where it has not been unusual for no one to run on the ballot, write-in votes have apparently re-elected the mayor, Jeff Wright, and selected five council members.

Wright received seven write-in votes. There were three other people who received one write-in vote each.

For Colwell City Council, the top five write-in vote-getters were Jennifer Cross, 8 votes; Ryan Wagner, 7 votes; Judy Budwig and Rachel Cross, 6 votes each; and Mark Kirsch, 5 votes.

Ten other people in Colwell received between 1 and 3 write-in votes each.

Gloria Carr, Floyd County auditor and commissioner of elections, said it can be frustrating when communities rely on write-in votes to fill positions.

She told the story of one election when there were no candidates for a township trustee position, and several candidates all received a single write-in vote. To determine the winner all the names were thrown in a hat and a county supervisor picked the apparent winner.

It turned out that person didn’t even live in the township, Carr said.

The county-wide turnout of 2,653 votes cast on Tuesday was 24.2% of the 10,959 registered voters in the county, according to information from Carr’s office.

This was the first time city and school district elections were held at the same time, on the odd-year November general election day. The Iowa Legislature changed the law to combine the two elections to help counties save money and to help boost voter turnout.

Two years ago, in 2017, the school board election in September in Floyd County attracted only a 3.4% turnout, but much of that may be due to the lack of competitive races on the ballot. In both Charles City and the Rudd-Rockford-Marble Rock school districts there were only as many candidates as seats available.

The 2017 city election in November attracted a 22.6% turnout, aided by competitive races for Charles City mayor, Marble Rock City Council, Rockford City Council and others.

Here are the unofficial results of the 2019 election which took place Tuesday in Floyd County:

FLOYD COUNTY-WIDE:

Public Measure: Shall the Floyd County Memorial Hospital of Charles City, Iowa, organized and governed under Chapter 37 of the Code of Iowa be changed to be established and governed under Chapter 347 of the Code of Iowa?

√ Yes — 1,717 — 68.0%
No — 809 — 32.0%

CITY ELECTIONS:

Charles City

City Council (vote for 3)

√ Phoebe Pitman — 758 23.2%
Craig Hamm — 655 — 20.1%
√ Phillip Knighten — 714 — 21.9%
√ Keith Starr [i] — 764 — 23.4%
Ann Teeter — 366 — 11.21%

Colwell

Mayor

√ [w] Jeff Wright [i] — 7 — 70%

City Council (vote for 5)

√ [w] Jennifer Cross — 8 — 17.4%
√ [w] Ryan Wagner — 7 — 15.2%
√ [w] Judy Budwig — 6 — 13.0%
√ [w] Rachel Cross — 6 — 13.0%
√ [w] Mark Kirsch — 5 — 10.9%

Floyd

Mayor

√ Trevis K. O’Connell [i] — 55 — 98.2%

City Council (vote for 3)

√ Merlin Holtz [i] — 42 — 23.6%
√ Michael Miller [i] — 48 — 27.0%
√ Cleone King [i] — 57 — 32.0%
Jeremy Stewart — 29 — 16.3%

Marble Rock

Mayor

√ Jerry Engelhardt [i] — 73 — 94.8%

City Council (vote for 2)

√ Chad Schriever [i] — 65 — 44.5%
√ Kaylah Schweizer — 54 — 37.0%
John P. Marzen [i] — 25 — 17.1%

Nora Springs

Mayor

√ Randy Hassman [i] — 228 — 98.7%

City Council (vote for 3)

√ Steve Blickenderfer [i] — 163 — 29.4%
√ Robert W. Moen — 174 — 31.4%
√ Brian Pederson [i] — 204 — 36.8%

Rockford

Mayor

√ Scott Johnson [i] — 180 — 91.5%

City Council (vote for 2)

√ Corey Johnson [i] — 177 — 49.3%
√ Carol J. Hoffarth — 179 — 49.9%

Public Measure: Do you approve of the discontinuance of the Board of Trustees of the Rockford Municipal Light Plant and turning over the operation of the Rockford Municipal Light Plant to the Rockford City Council?

Yes — 90 — 40.5%
√ No — 132 — 59.5%

Rudd

Mayor

√ Jeffrey C. Buland — 53 — 84.1%
Donna M. Lunsford [i] — 8 — 12.7%

City Council (vote for 3)

√ Karin Winters — 53 — 37.6%
√ Craig Reinke — 51 — 36.2%
√ [w]

SCHOOL DISTRICT ELECTIONS:

Charles City School District

Director (vote for 2)

√ Janiece Bergland — 1,160 — 34.9%
√ Patricia Rottinghaus — 1,155 — 34.8%
Robin Macomber [i] — 984 — 29.6%

Public Measure: Shall the following public measure be adopted: Summary: To adopt a Revenue Purpose Statement specifying the use of revenues for school infrastructure purposed the Charles City Community School District will receive from the State of Iowa Secure an Advanced Vision for Education Fund.

√ Yes — 1,438 — 78.2%
No — 401 — 21.8%

RRMR School District

Director (vote for 3)

√ Angie Johnson [i] — 356 — 32.0%
√ Heidi Marzen [i] — 380 — 34.2%
√ Janette Lien [i] — 367 — 33.0%

NOTES:

All results unofficial until canvassed.
[i] means candidate was an incumbent.
[w] means candidate was write-in.
Percentages may not add up to 100% because of unlisted write-in votes.
Source: Floyd County Auditor’s Office