Catching Up with Ankeny City Council Candidates: Meet Jim McKenna

The Ankeny City Council election is less than a month away and five candidates have launched their campaigns.

on the council. Incumbents include Tom Strait, Gary Welch and Craig Block. The challengers are Mark Holm and Jim McKenna.

The council election is Nov. 8.

Ankeny Patch recently asked each council candidate to complete a questionnaire, posing a series of questions ranging from basic information to their takes on specific issues within the city.

We will publish one questionnaire daily this week. Today, we introduce Jim McKenna, an Ankeny resident seeking his first term on the Ankeny City Council.

JIM McKENNA

Age: 61

Address: 517 N.E. Third St.

Occupation: Maplewood Village Condominium Association manager

Education: Ankeny High School, 1968. I have taken business management classes and environmental training courses throughout my 39 years of service to the community as an employee in the Ankeny Utilities Department. I am a certified water and water distribution operator with the state of Iowa.  

Family: Wife Suzy; son Matt and his wife, Tia; daughter Mollie Vallejo and her husband, Dan; and four grandchildren.

How long has Ankeny been your home?: 58 years.

How may voters contact you?: People may contact me at weth2o@msn.com.

Residents have complained at recent council meetings about the pace of storm sewer projects and that they weren't kept informed of plans. How can the city better inform residents of construction in their neighborhoods?

Typically, the city either sends out letters to or schedules neighborhood meetings for all residents who will be affected by large projects, especially when disruption to their normal daily routines during the project are unavoidable. Most projects go fairly well but, at times, unknown or unanticipated issues can arise causing delays in construction and prolonged inconveniences for the local residents. Weather is usually the biggest factor, but sometimes conditions change in the original planning and adjustments have to be made.

If adjustments require additional engineering or other legal issues need to be resolved, those types of issues can also cause inconvenient delays. And, of course, not all contractors exhibit the same levels of expertise. Planned project updates provided to all residents affected may be a beneficial means of keeping all parties up to date as projects proceed, especially if problems are encountered that will cause delays affecting many residents.

Are you happy with the city's current tax rate? If not, what should it be set at and how would the additional money be spent or trimmed from the budget?

I am against the recently passed two-percent franchise fee placed on our energy bills and I believe we may have the possibility of reducing our current tax rate. We need to re-evaluate our current spending levels to see where possible reduced spending makes sense. We have many capital improvement projects planned and although each project may have good merit, we need to re-evalute the priorities of those projects and phase them in over a longer period of time, or eliminate those that we can live without. 

Ankeny is no longer as attractive as we once were in attracting business for our economic growth which we desparately need to help with our overall tax burden. The franchise fee is just another tax. The problem for our citizens is that we cannot deduct the annual franchise fees on our income tax and during high heating billing months the tax will make those difficult-to-pay bills even more difficult. We need to take another hard look at why this fee is really needed. Water billing fees also need to be re-evaluated for the same reasons.

If the city had a $100,000 surplus that had to be spent this year, where should it go?

First choice, refund it back to the taxpayers. Second choice, level the old water shop, streets garage, fire station and Chamber offices in the 700 block of Southwest Third Street to the corner of Southwest Elm to start cleaning up the old uptown area. We could possibly move the current Uptown Farmers Market to those locations. Water, sewer and power would be more conveniently available for the vendors and public. We could maybe keep the old fire station and open it up during days of inclement weather, if the building is safe enough to do so.

What experience do you have working on councils, boards or commissions?

I served on the Children's Water Festival committee that set up annual Water Festivals at DMACC Ankeny Campus for Iowa fifth-graders. Over my ten years of volunteering at this event, thousands of fifth-grade students state-wide have attended this successful festival learning many facets of water and environment quality issues and processes. I've served on the Ankeny Junior Football Board for two years and was in charge of getting the fields ready and maintained each week for games held, at that time, at OLIH Catholic Church fields. I've served on various operator training planning committees over the years for certified water and wastewater operators required to obtain continuing education units to maintain state certifications.

What do you feel is the biggest threat to the community?

Insufficient planning and excessive spending on marginal projects may lead to possible tax hikes or other added cost burdens to the community.  The current tax rate (of $11.17 per $1,000 of assessed valuation) appears to be putting Ankeny at a disadvantage in competing for additional economic development. Our existing infrastructure needs to be properly maintained before we add additional large infrastructure to our inventories.

Besides the people, what is the community's greatest asset?

Ankeny has many favorable ammenities that draw new citizens to our city.  Ankeny provides excellent public safety, provides a wide range of programs for our youth and adults, library services, public utility services and great schools, all provided by very knowledgable and professional people. A person doesn't have to leave Ankeny very often to find just about everything they need in products and services.