In her bid to unseat three-term Republican Dallas County Supervisor Mark Hanson of Waukee, Democrat candidate Julie Stewart, also from Waukee, has campaigned around the county in a series of Listening Posts, public forums where she listened to voters air their concerns and also shared her vision for the direction of Dallas County.
According to Dallas County’s form of county government, Stewart seeks to represent the supervisors’ second district, but all county residents will vote for the second district candidate as if it were an at-large seat.
This has led Stewart to campaign throughout the county, holding Listening Posts in Perry, Adel, Redfield, Dallas Center, Waukee and elsewhere.
She has also been a regular attendee at meetings of the Dallas County Board of Supervisors for about six months and toured the Dallas County jail in October in an effort to see at first hand the challenges faced by the overcrowded sheriff’s department.
Stewart grew up on a century farm in Hardin County, the eldest of eight children in a family that took a lively interest in local politics and public affairs.
She married at 18 and raised three children, eventually running a small retail business while her husband farmed. When her husband died of cancer, Stewart, now 50, went back to school at UNI, got her degree and taught high school government and U.S. history until consolidation closed the small rural school in Franklin County.
A second marriage and a second spouse lost to cancer eventually led Stewart to Dallas County, where her young grandchildren lived. She has more than 30 years of experience in various organizations, from chairing a Parent Teacher Organization to sitting on a school board, leading a successful effort to pass an enrichment tax for the local schools, helping organize RAGBRAI, acting as finance director for Fourth of July celebrations and others.
Stewart told the Waukee Chamber of Commerce Oct. 25 that she has “a successful track record both as a manager of people and as a numbers person. I’ve worked myself up, and was known for always reading the budget when I was on the school board.”
At her campaign Listening Posts, Stewart rapidly counted off the important issues overseen by the supervisors, matters ranging from infrastructure and watersheds to the law enforcement center referendum, administration buildings, human services, conservation, bike trails, economic development, county labor negotiations and others.
When asked by the Waukee Chamber what one issue she would like to discuss with Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, if she were given one-to-one face time with the governor, Stewart said education is her primary issue.
“I was part of People United for Rural Education,” she said. “I fought hard for that. I was one of 1,000 people who went to the statehouse because at that time, in the late ’70s, they wanted to close all schools under 1,000 population, and we marched on the capital and put a stop to it.”
Stewart is currently a substitute teacher in the Des Moines public schools and also a tutor at the Huntington Learning Center. She has promised to make the supervisor position a full-time job and has expressed provisional support for the effort to expand the number of Dallas County Supervisors from three to five.
To learn more about Julie Stewart’s candidacy and positions, visit her Facebook page.
