Large crowd greets challengers for Mason City mayor, council (PHOTOS & VIDEO)
MASON CITY - A second public forum for candidates for office in Mason City was held Monday evening.
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MASON CITY – A second public forum for candidates for office in Mason City was held Monday evening.
The event was held at the Prime N Wine Restaurant and organized by Chris Watts. The public was invited to attend, as were all candidates for the offices of mayor and city council. Challengers Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds (for mayor) and Sheryl Gerk, Jodi Draper, Leonard Foster and Matt Marquardt (for city council) all appeared and took questions from a large crowd of well over 100 citizens.
No incumbent candidates appeared at the forum. Many in the crowd were confused as to why no elected officials attended. Repeated attempts to contact the incumbents were made, according to organizer Chris Watts and Hampton Mayor Shawn Dietz, who moderated the forum. Council members Scott Tornquist and Janet Solberg indicated in interviews with other media that the event was biased, they are resting on their records, and all four incumbents are united as a “team” against the challengers.
Mayor Dietz still directed questions to the incumbents, who had name tags placed in front of their empty chairs at the table next to the challengers.
City council member Alex Kuhn attended.
Mayoral candidate Max Weaver compared his “three D’s” (democracy, diversity, dedication) to the “three D’s” of Eric Bookmeyer (decorum, discipline and diligence).
“I’m going to bring those three things for everybody,” Mr. Weaver said.
“I’ll also add two more “D’s” to Eric Bookmeyer,” Mr. Weaver said.
“Disappearance and disrespectful.”
Watch video of entire forum:
Photos:
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Citizens
Jodi
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Citizens
Leonard
Sandy Servantez
Chris Watts, organizer and volunteer
Shawn Dietz
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Quinn and Matt
Max, Quinn, Matt
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor, and Matt Marquardt, fourth ward candidate
Jodi
Citizens
Jodi Draper, candidate for second ward city council
Sleep
Leonard Foster, At-Large candidate
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Quinn
Leonard Foster, At-Large candidate
Overflow crowd
Citizens
Quinn Symonds, candidate for mayor
Jodi
Onlookers
Great crowd
Leonard Foster, At-Large candidate
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Candidates prepare for questions
Leonard Foster, At-Large candidate
Jodi
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Quinn and Matt
Leonard Foster, At-Large candidate
Chris Watts
Citizens
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Quinn and Matt
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Jodi
Sheryl Gerk, candidate for second ward city council
Matt Marquardt and Sheryl Gerk, candidates
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Sheryl and Jodi
Leonard Foster, (left) and Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor
Quinn Symonds and Matt Marquardt, candidates
Quinn
Citizens
Quinn Symonds
Sheryl Gerk, candidate for second ward city council
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor, Sheryl Gerk, candidate for second ward city council
Crowd
Candidates
Candidates prepare for forum
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Jodi
Voters
Crowd
Leonard Foster, Max Weaver
Leonard Foster and Max Weaver
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Sheryl Gerk
Max Weaver and Quinn Symonds, candidates for mayor
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Shawn Dietz, moderator, Mayor of Hampton
Jodi
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Great crowd
Max Weaver, candidate for mayor
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Leonard Foster
Matt Marquardt, candidate for fourth ward city council
Jodi
Fourth ward voter
Appointed NIACC Board member John Rowe
What will Max say?
Leonard Foster, At-Large candidate
Bog crowd
Crowd
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31 thoughts on “Large crowd greets challengers for Mason City mayor, council (PHOTOS & VIDEO)”
Max is doing a great job, would love to see him & book face off the right way. but book won’t show up! Where did he go? Seems like he doesn’t care about our town or us anymore, time to let max come in and clean his mess up & wake the people of mason city up! and make them aware of whats really going on in our city.
The candidates will show up, but will they be seated? Will there be seats on the stage for them? I have never been in that church so I don’t know the set up.
Interesting observations on Max plan for a 300-500 industrial park. Not very real though and her is why.
Property is not even in city limits to my knowledge
Not zoned industrial to my knowledge
Cost for land alone would be approximately $3-$5 million and that is for ag land. If it is commercial land the price would probably go up five fold.
Has no infrastructure
No electricity no natural gas. the Alliant plant is a back up plant that doesn’t even serve Mason City right now. never was designed to do that.
lack of water. Too far out for adequate fire protection
Would be an impossible fire rating from insurance standpoint
Has a high level of heavy slow moving truck traffic
Danger of a major fire. if the landfill caught on fire like the one did in Iowa City it could burn for months. remember the Behr fire from a few years ago.
Industries want state designated shovel ready sites.
Now you are talking serious money probably in the neighborhood of $20 million dollars.
Not feasible at all.
All this from a guy that has consistently balked at spending a little over $100,000 for the North Iowa Corridor And who opposed the plant that was going to take the trash. I agreed with that decision on the trash but who do you think would want to put in a big plant next to a landfill. Cmon man?
All in all this could easily be
I agree with all your observations, Hacker. There has to be infrastructure already in place or easier to extend. There are more desirable places closer to town that would be easier to develop, preferably on the south side of town near the avenue’s access to transportation. I’d think these challenger candidates would want to put something stinky right next to the Country Club. 😉
So how many of the 100+ people at Monday night’s forum were the same people who were at Saturday morning’s forum? It doesn’t seem like a very large crowd to me for a “hotly contested” race.
Actually Katie those who attended the last meeting at the Mason City room, only a hundred or so, were stamped with ink that won’t come off. These people were then turned away at the Prime & Wine because they had already heard everything and seating was limited. I am assuming tonight they wll use some sort of fsce recognition to keep those out who were already at the other meetings.
2) ALEX KUHN is a real leader with character and guts. Max even said Kuhn has guts and Matt thanked him for coming and said he will work with him if elected. He stood in the back of the room and very respectfully listened to the candidates ideas, took some criticism on policy from some of the challengers and then stuck around afterwards and shook hands with all citizens. I like him and will get behind him moving forward after seeing how he conducts himself with the public, including those who may disagree with him on policy. He still treated them all with a high level of respect and dignity. Good guy!
Kuhn has been VERY concerned about Max and Matt winning their elections. He has been working VERY HARD behind the scenes to see that they LOSE. Now Kuhn sees that up to three seats at the table are in real jeopardy, his safe team is in disarray and shambles, and he stood in the back of the room to say he showed up. You can give him that. Is he a real leader or a resume-builder who wants out of Mason City at his first chance? Time will tell, but he didn’t fight very hard for human rights, sanitation workers, Forest Park residents, anyone, really. He has been a lock-stepper with the Red Hare, Eric Bookmeyer, and he should be ashamed of that.
Geez, Peter. You’re not going to make friends or get support from voters by comparing Kuhn or anyone else to a Nazi. That’s way over the top. You’re sounding way too much like Peat Childron now.
Democracy aint always pretty. I cant be. People have a wide range of opinions, values, views, different ways of speaking, addressing others, emotions. To try to control or corral this like cattle is just wrong and I wonder what our Founding Fathers would think. Throw Bookmeyer and Tornquist and the other two bums out they have worn out their welcome.
Rumor has it that the INCUMBENTS are going to show up at the next forum TOMORROW OCTOBER 29TH, 6:30 PM GRACE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH– 200 14TH NW.
A little late for the Dream Team to show up – they already made their statement that they are better than everyone else! Now, they are getting worried they made a wrong choice to ignore the voters! YUP, TOO LATE !!!
It sounds to me as if Matt got his fingers slapped by the audience a couple of times. And I wonder why nobody else sees it as a conflict of interest for Mr. Foster to be complaining about the HRC being decimated when it directly affected the livelihood of an immediate family member of his. If any of the incumbents were doing that, there’d be hell to pay. And remember, I was in favor of retaining the HRC. I just don’t like different standards for challengers and incumbents. You moan and groan about Ms. Solberg getting more insurance business being a conflict because she’s on the council, but yet she says her insurance savvy saved the City $80,000. How come none of you eagle-eyed challengers noticed that line item expense went down or did an op-ed on it? Oh. That’s right. You don’t report good things here.
31 thoughts on “Large crowd greets challengers for Mason City mayor, council (PHOTOS & VIDEO)”
Max is doing a great job, would love to see him & book face off the right way. but book won’t show up! Where did he go? Seems like he doesn’t care about our town or us anymore, time to let max come in and clean his mess up & wake the people of mason city up! and make them aware of whats really going on in our city.
If you’re not a somebody to Eric, you’re a nobody to Eric. He an elitist because he married into it and now he’s better than you.
The candidates will show up, but will they be seated? Will there be seats on the stage for them? I have never been in that church so I don’t know the set up.
Interesting observations on Max plan for a 300-500 industrial park. Not very real though and her is why.
Property is not even in city limits to my knowledge
Not zoned industrial to my knowledge
Cost for land alone would be approximately $3-$5 million and that is for ag land. If it is commercial land the price would probably go up five fold.
Has no infrastructure
No electricity no natural gas. the Alliant plant is a back up plant that doesn’t even serve Mason City right now. never was designed to do that.
lack of water. Too far out for adequate fire protection
Would be an impossible fire rating from insurance standpoint
Has a high level of heavy slow moving truck traffic
Danger of a major fire. if the landfill caught on fire like the one did in Iowa City it could burn for months. remember the Behr fire from a few years ago.
Industries want state designated shovel ready sites.
Now you are talking serious money probably in the neighborhood of $20 million dollars.
Not feasible at all.
All this from a guy that has consistently balked at spending a little over $100,000 for the North Iowa Corridor And who opposed the plant that was going to take the trash. I agreed with that decision on the trash but who do you think would want to put in a big plant next to a landfill. Cmon man?
All in all this could easily be
I agree with all your observations, Hacker. There has to be infrastructure already in place or easier to extend. There are more desirable places closer to town that would be easier to develop, preferably on the south side of town near the avenue’s access to transportation. I’d think these challenger candidates would want to put something stinky right next to the Country Club. 😉
Therinfastructure is already there on far S. Federal and 43rd St. SW. How about we develop there?
So how many of the 100+ people at Monday night’s forum were the same people who were at Saturday morning’s forum? It doesn’t seem like a very large crowd to me for a “hotly contested” race.
Actually Katie those who attended the last meeting at the Mason City room, only a hundred or so, were stamped with ink that won’t come off. These people were then turned away at the Prime & Wine because they had already heard everything and seating was limited. I am assuming tonight they wll use some sort of fsce recognition to keep those out who were already at the other meetings.
meant to say “face recognition”
LOL
Just want to say to everyone that after watching the debate I have come around and I support Max, Matt, Jodi and Leonard. Hope everyone votes!
Wow, Reggie, that’s awesome! Was it because the others didn’t show, or because u were able to meet them in person & could feel their sincerity?
@Really: I highly doubt that was Reggie Red posting. Matt’s cronies are posting fake posts on here a lot lately.
You are correct, not me.
I attended last night. two things I learned:
1) Challengers have a lot of diverse ideas
2) ALEX KUHN is a real leader with character and guts. Max even said Kuhn has guts and Matt thanked him for coming and said he will work with him if elected. He stood in the back of the room and very respectfully listened to the candidates ideas, took some criticism on policy from some of the challengers and then stuck around afterwards and shook hands with all citizens. I like him and will get behind him moving forward after seeing how he conducts himself with the public, including those who may disagree with him on policy. He still treated them all with a high level of respect and dignity. Good guy!
Kuhn sees how things are going, and his attendance says he thinks he’ll be working with this group in January!
Kuhn has been VERY concerned about Max and Matt winning their elections. He has been working VERY HARD behind the scenes to see that they LOSE. Now Kuhn sees that up to three seats at the table are in real jeopardy, his safe team is in disarray and shambles, and he stood in the back of the room to say he showed up. You can give him that. Is he a real leader or a resume-builder who wants out of Mason City at his first chance? Time will tell, but he didn’t fight very hard for human rights, sanitation workers, Forest Park residents, anyone, really. He has been a lock-stepper with the Red Hare, Eric Bookmeyer, and he should be ashamed of that.
Geez, Peter. You’re not going to make friends or get support from voters by comparing Kuhn or anyone else to a Nazi. That’s way over the top. You’re sounding way too much like Peat Childron now.
It was an awesome turn out! I thought everyone did a great job. I learned a lot about the people running for office. I am looking forward to tonight’s
Democracy aint always pretty. I cant be. People have a wide range of opinions, values, views, different ways of speaking, addressing others, emotions. To try to control or corral this like cattle is just wrong and I wonder what our Founding Fathers would think. Throw Bookmeyer and Tornquist and the other two bums out they have worn out their welcome.
yea throw’em out
This is the a Democracy is supposed to operate!
Hey I heard ole skippee was sittin in the back of the room and dozed off nearly fell outta his chair!
The main pic in this story looks like Max the Messiah, parting the Red Sea and taking us to the Promised Land.
I thought they did a great job,cant wait to see max win
and also with you.
This should be a hoot…
What a shame all the incumbents didn’t attend. This is a time that will go down in infamy for Mason City.
Rumor has it that the INCUMBENTS are going to show up at the next forum TOMORROW OCTOBER 29TH, 6:30 PM GRACE UNITED METHODIST CHURCH– 200 14TH NW.
A little late for the Dream Team to show up – they already made their statement that they are better than everyone else! Now, they are getting worried they made a wrong choice to ignore the voters! YUP, TOO LATE !!!
I was told it was a croc of crap , a sit up to make ,Max ,Matt ,Mr. foster and Jody look bad..it didn’t work ,they looked great up there talking
It sounds to me as if Matt got his fingers slapped by the audience a couple of times. And I wonder why nobody else sees it as a conflict of interest for Mr. Foster to be complaining about the HRC being decimated when it directly affected the livelihood of an immediate family member of his. If any of the incumbents were doing that, there’d be hell to pay. And remember, I was in favor of retaining the HRC. I just don’t like different standards for challengers and incumbents. You moan and groan about Ms. Solberg getting more insurance business being a conflict because she’s on the council, but yet she says her insurance savvy saved the City $80,000. How come none of you eagle-eyed challengers noticed that line item expense went down or did an op-ed on it? Oh. That’s right. You don’t report good things here.