For the first time in about two years, the Marshalltown city council — along with Mayor Joel Greer, City Administrator Carol Webb, consultant Cindy Kendall and department heads — held a strategic planning/goal setting session on the second floor of the Veterans Memorial Coliseum Tuesday afternoon and identified key priorities and objectives in partnership with Story City City Administrator Mark Jackson, who led the meeting.

Jackson, an alumni of Western Michigan University, is in his 31st year in Story City, and he took time to introduce himself while asking those in attendance to be specific about what they’re hoping to achieve — as Jackson noted, every town’s leaders want economic growth.

He then asked the mayor, councilors and city employees to identify some accomplishments they’re proud of, which started with Marshalltown Public Library Director Sarah Rosenblum highlighting a change in shelving that led to a major increase in book checkouts. Greer pointed to the successful renewal of the Local Option Sales Tax (LOST), and Jackson opened the floor up to a wide variety of responses, from the State Street reconstruction to lead grant awards to police technology investments to Destination Iowa grants.

The revitalization of the community post-tornado and derecho came up frequently during that initial discussion before they moved on to concerns, which were familiar to those who have paid attention to recent council meetings: nuisance enforcement issues and communicating them to the public, redeveloping the former hospital and McFarland Clinic buildings along with the Marshalltown Mall and getting the city back to a full staffing level with several key positions such as police chief, fire chief, housing and community development director and parks and recreation director either vacant or about to be, homelessness, declining revenues as a result of actions by the state legislature, increasing construction costs, a shortage of available housing, Marshalltown’s regional reputation and many more.

After the Iowa Department of Transportation (DOT) recently rejected the permit application for one of Marshalltown’s two fixed site traffic cameras and all of their proposed mobile sites, the partial loss of ATE revenue was mentioned as a concern, but Police Chief Mike Tupper noted that unlike other cities, Marshalltown hadn’t been budgeting those dollars into backfilling its general fund. As he predicted what laws the state legislature might pass next, Jackson said his guess was some sort of a cap on property tax revenue increases.

Councilor Gary Thompson attempted to boil the city’s problems down to a simple reality, especially when comparing it to other places Jackson had previously mentioned like Story City and Mason City.

“We are a poor town, so there’s a whole list of issues that we face communally that you guys don’t face being that close to Ames and getting the growth that you guys are getting in Gilbert because of Ames,” Thompson said. “We don’t raise enough property taxes to do what we need to do, so that’s a bigger issue for a town like us. I don’t know how you want to address that.”

From there, Jackson segued into the opportunities those in attendance saw for the city, and some responses included the chance to redevelop the former hospital and McFarland Clinic property, expanding the trail system and increasing the city’s water capacity.

Parks and Rec Director Geoff Hubbard, whose impending departure for the same position in Johnston came up a few times throughout the session, was asked for his impressions as he prepares to leave his hometown.

“From the time I got here five years ago, almost six years ago, to where we are now, we have put forth a lot of good funding for recreational opportunities and quality of life amenities in town,” he said. “I feel very confident leaving here that in the next two or three years, quality of life is just going to escalate because of the Linn Creek District projects and what those could lead to in other things. So I feel like I’m leaving things in pretty good hands and better than I found them.”

Rosenblum also touted the library’s status as a regional hub that attracts visitors not just from Marshalltown and Marshall County but the surrounding areas as well. After Councilor Melisa Fonseca noted that she was the first Latina ever elected to the city council, Marshalltown’s overall diversity was identified as a key opportunity, although Tupper felt that it hadn’t been fully embraced and leveraged yet.

“There’s such a large group of people that we haven’t fully engaged. If we could just fully engage those folks, I think our community could grow and we could do a lot of positive things from an economic development standpoint,” Tupper said. “Restaurants are great for old fat guys like me, but there’s just people that aren’t involved with their city governments that need to be involved. We’re not meeting their needs.”

Hubbard attributed it to widespread apathy among all demographics, and Tupper suggested making an effort to “meet them where they’re at.” Fonseca said many residents simply have no idea what the city does and how it affects them.

Councilor Jeff Schneider identified Highway 14 and the north side of town as a key opportunity for redevelopment and growth, and Thompson offered his take that because of the community’s diversity, it was hard for residents to coalesce around major projects. Instead, he argued, the city should focus on “the gnats that get in your face” instead of chasing “the big fish.”

As the topic of outreach and communication with residents continued to percolate, Schneider suggested an idea that would become very popular by the meeting’s end: hiring a public relations/communications specialist as part of the city staff. Jackson asked about some of the current community outreach efforts, which primarily involve public meetings, traditional and social media hits and engaging with constituents who reach out to their councilors.

Councilor Mark Mitchell, who was elected last November, said some residents are hesitant to get involved with boards and commissions or show up for meetings to voice their opinions for fear of being labeled “naysayers,” and Thompson felt the city had many “check writers” but not enough doers. City Clerk Alicia Hunter expressed support for a residential street improvement program, and Tupper and Acting Fire Chief Christopher Cross agreed that the city had under budgeted for replacing vehicles.

Human Resources Director Jill Petermeier called for improved security at city hall, citing the fact that someone was living downstairs for a few weekends before being discovered, and Cross identified the replacement of the MFD’s self contained breathing apparatus and a fire engine as key upcoming projects. Tupper, who is set to retire at the end of January, said body cameras and Flock cameras will also need to be replaced, and councilors began to form a consensus around developing some sort of long-term technology plan.

On the capital projects front, Councilor Mike Ladehoff hoped the city would focus on finishing projects currently in progress like street reconstructions and the trail, water plaza and bridge in the Linn Creek District before introducing any new ones.

Schneider also returned to a controversial topic that the council spent several meetings debating last year and advocated for the establishment of a city-run garbage, compost and recycling utility. Currently, at least four private haulers operate within Marshalltown.

Cross called for the prohibition of open burning within the city limits and eliminating the relationship with the third-party vendor contracted to perform fire code inspections. In general, outsourcing less of the city’s work across several departments was identified as a priority.

Schneider also suggested a “happy path” for economic development opportunities that would involve a more coordinated effort from city staff, citing the easy experience his employer, MARSHALLTOWN Company, enjoyed building a new facility in the Kansas City area.

The councilors and staff were then asked to rank their top five priorities identified with five being the highest and one being the lowest, and about 15 minutes later, the results were tabulated. The highest priority with 42 points was hiring a communication/public information officer, followed by establishing a citywide garbage/compost/recycling service (41 points) and developing a technology master plan (38 points). Other high priorities slightly lower down on the list included continuing the downtown master plan, sprinkler system incentives for downtown buildings, determining the use of unspent bond money (estimated at about $18 million), remodeling city hall and streamlining the economic development process.

Fonseca felt the ideal candidate for the communications job should be at least bilingual, and in discussing the garbage issue, Thompson said consolidating the service would solve a lot of the city’s problems, and Greer noted the impact the garbage trucks have on the condition of city streets.

The final discussion item before the meeting adjourned after a little over two hours was organizational effectiveness and how it can be improved. While Ladehoff shared a positive outlook on communication among staff and councilors, Mitchell said he had had “the opposite experience” and was frustrated that other councilors hadn’t responded to his concerns about nuisance violations.

“One councilor said ‘Oh, he doesn’t see nothing wrong with it,’ and I showed it to Chief Tupper and he said it’s definitely a problem,” Mitchell said.

Tupper then jumped in and asked not to be brought into the middle of the situation.

“I feel like this is a great example of department heads getting ambushed. We don’t wanna be in the middle. I’m leaving pretty soon, so I can say this without fear of getting fired, I hope,” the chief said. “We don’t want to be in the middle of your disputes.”

“This wasn’t a dispute,” Mitchell replied.

“It is, and that’s what it’s turning into. I think a lot of this communication needs to be funneled through the city manager. That’s my opinion,” Tupper said.

Finance Director Diana Steiner agreed with Tupper, and it sparked a larger conversation on whether councilors should go directly to department heads with issues or approach Webb about them first. Thompson suggested putting the agenda for Monday meetings out the Wednesday prior (they currently go out the Thursday before), but Ladehoff was of the opinion that councilors already have plenty of time to prepare and get any lingering questions answered by city staff.

“You have four days to go over that agenda. That’s plenty of time,” he said.

Schneider said the city council manual instructs councilors to direct their inquiries to the city administrator first, and he encouraged his colleagues to do the same.

“I think the protocol you described, that’s been the protocol ever since I’ve been here. It’s just not been followed,” Tupper said.

Greer added that while he was working as the acting city administrator, he had to send reminders to a few unnamed councilors to “cool it” on directly approaching department heads, but he didn’t feel that much changed afterward. Councilor Greg Nichols said he came in a time of instability within city hall and felt he had to do things the way he did to get an answer.

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Contact Robert Maharry

at 641-753-6611 ext. 255 or

rmaharry@timesrepublican.com.