Waukee Voters Will Chose from Crowded School Board Field

Voters in the Waukee school district will choose four board of education members from a crowded field in next month’s school board election.

The lone incumbent in the seven-candidate field is Mary Scheve, who told the Des Moines Register that she wants to help the school district keep financial costs from exploding along with burgeoning enrollment.

Also on the Sept. 10 ballot are Sarah Bowman, David Cunningham, Dale Finnegan, Wendy Liskey, Patrick Nehls and Nancy Umsted.

Three other incumbents – Russ Wiesley, Dave Duncan and Tracy Lepeltak – aren’t seeking re-election.

The candidates outlined their priorities in an email questionnaire from the newspaper. Among the questions was their motivations for serving on the school board.

“My children are the most important people in my life and I want to be involved in their education,” Bowman responded.

“Being a former teacher gives me insight into what it’s like inside a classroom on a day-to-day basis,” Cunningham said.

Finnegan said he wants to make a positive contribution to his community and “help Waukee schools continue to develop and provide opportunities for all our children.”

Liskey said that volunteering in an elementary school, leading its PTO and serving on the district’s boundary and secondary study committees has given her “a unique viewpoint of our district’s challenges” and she wants to “help guide the decisions that will impact our students in the years to come.”

Nehls cited his information technology background and said his record of service and leadership in the community, including work on the Waukee Community School Foundation, “will be an asset to the school board in this continued growth and transition phase of the district.”

Scheve also said that as the only incumbent, she provides important continuity to the board.

Umstead said she’d like to return to the board to for the same reason.

“Having been on a school board before, I spent a lot of time participating in training opportunities to better understand the expectations and requirements of being a good board member,” she responded. “I was concerned that if there were three or four new participants that it would take time for them to learn what it takes to be a good board member.”