Dan Nieman, assistant director/reference librarian at the South Sioux City Public Library, talks about how a grant will help the library to preserve historical documents in its collection.
Residents of Sioux City are getting a unique opportunity this October. For the first time in 20 years, they will get to choose from among nine candidates in the City Council primary election on Oct. 7. The primary will narrow the field down to six finalists.
Sioux City council elections have typically had a good number of candidates, but nine is close to the highest number of candidates on a city primary ballot. None of these candidates is an incumbent, which makes this election even more unique.
Sioux City residents, be sure to get out and vote. There were 18,333 voters in the 2021 city election, with only four candidates and no primary. There are about 45,000 registered voters eligible to vote in the 2025 primary. That means your votes count a lot more than when you vote for president.
Just a few extra votes can make a difference in a city election. In the 2021 city council election, the losing candidate lost by only 89 votes.
People are also reading… Sioux City man charged with causing infant’s skull fracture Landlord repossesses Sioux City theater, film festival scrambles for alternate locations Iowa district hired superintendent despite false Morgan State doctorate claim on his resume I-29 rollover accident sends one man to hospital with life-threatening injuries Driver in I-29 rollover at Sergeant Bluff dies from injuries South Sioux City man sentenced to 9 days jail for assault Siouxland residents protest for Des Moines superintendent being held in Woodbury County jail Booze, sex and strip clubs: Read the full indictment against Hobert Rupe Sioux City police release name of fatal stabbing victim First From The Journal: Former Des Moines Superintendent Ian Roberts no longer being held in Woodbury County Contractor lawsuit says city owes $618,000 from Grandview Park tank project NAIA football: Dordt scores winner with 13 seconds left, beats NWC for first time ever Man formally charged with murder for Sioux City stabbing Worker dies in Spirit Lake construction accident Sioux City man gets additional prison time for shootings
Another phenomenon that seems to occur in local elections is undervoting, when voters pick fewer candidates than they could. In that 2021 city election, about 25% of the voters didn’t use their opportunity to vote for three candidates. The two incumbents received many more votes than the two candidates brand new to city government.
Local elections are the most important because City Council members affect what we do on a day-to-day basis. They can cause potholes to be fixed or not, permits to be issued promptly, and control the level of police and fire protection.
I have often written about the impact that citizens can have on their local elected officials. City Council members are pretty easy to contact and usually very responsive to citizen concerns. Legislators get thousands of email messages from across the country, but City Council members mainly get communications about city business.
There is just over a month between the filing date for declarations of candidacy and the primary election. That didn’t leave a lot of time for citizens to vet the candidates. Local media sources have done a good job of interviewing candidates, asking each the same questions, so citizens can compare and contrast.
There are a lot of consistent themes between the candidates. Streamlining city procedures, economic development, dealing with issues of homelessness and lowering property taxes have been common concerns. I hope a new council will make some inroads into these issues, but citizens need to recognize that there is only so much the city can do. Many city requirements are mandated by state and federal government. The Legislature is also in the process of trying to reduce local property taxes, but it is not likely that there will be state funding for cities out of these efforts.
I took a look at the fiscal 2026 city budget to see areas to cut. It will be a hard job for the new council. About one-third of the budget goes towards public safety. I haven’t heard a candidate yet who wants to save money by reducing the number or salaries of police and fire. Another one-third goes to public works and utilities. This is the money spent on fixing potholes, another priority. If the city simply stopped spending any money at all on parks it would only reduce its budget by 5%. So it will be hard to cut and will have to be done with a small sharp paring knife rather than a meat cleaver.
One of the candidates summed up his approach by saying the city should work with and not against citizens. It is unfortunate that so many citizens think local government is working against them. Because of the myriad of rules and ordinances that dictate what is done in the city, many of our citizens see working with city government as going to see the all-mighty Wizard of Oz – an unapproachable expert who will only tell you “no” after taking a lot of time to reach that conclusion.
When I served on the Planning and Zoning Commission, I thought that the most important thing that P&Z could do for its citizens was to explain what it was doing and why and give citizens a voice. It wouldn’t make you less concerned when you got a notice out of the blue from the city that your neighbor plans to build a mega-garage close to your property line, but maybe you could go home satisfied that you were listened to and you understood why she was being allowed to build.
Please take advantage of this opportunity to affect your local government and vote. Read and watch a few of the candidate interviews. Figure out for yourself who is most likely to be a thoughtful candidate who will do what is best for Sioux City after listening to citizens and learning about the issues at hand. And thank all of the candidates for their efforts to make Sioux City a better place by vying for a hard and sometimes tedious job.
Suzan Stewart is a retired corporate attorney. During the 40 years she has lived in Sioux City, she has been involved in a variety of local and state volunteer activities, including serving as chair of the Woodbury County Republican Party. She and her husband, Dr. Bob Stewart, are the parents of four children and have six grandchildren.
The Regulars
The Regulars
Suzan Stewart is a retired corporate attorney. During the 40 years she has lived in Sioux City, she has been involved in a variety of local and state volunteer activities, including serving as chair of the Woodbury County Republican Party. She and her husband, Dr. Bob Stewart, are the parents of four children and have five grandchildren.
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