Around Des Moines

1. Improve voter turnout for school board elections. The regular reports I write on the Des Moines Public Schools School Board meetings demonstrate the range of topics school boards handle; they are not just for parents with children in the schools. In addition, the regular reports provide a year-long record of information on current school board members to help assess their qualifications should those with terms ending in 2008 choose to seek re-election. This is far more information than I have had when voting in the past.

2. Improve voter turnout for city council elections. The turnout across Iowa for elections in 2007 was dreadfully low. A pass I made through a farmers market revealed little knowledge of candidates and even less thought about issues that should be considered for city council elections. While some municipalities may hold elections in 2008, the next election for Des Moines officials will be in 2009.

3. Improve voter awareness about candidates for county supervisor. There will likely be a special election held in Polk County seeking money for a new court house. Other than that, more work needs to be done to inform the public about the county board of supervisors and their actions before candidates have to file for the election.

4. Improve tenants rights. Want young people in Des Moines? Want to protect older people? Want the middle-aged to stay here? Then start treating tenants with more respect. Residential renters need recycling rights. Property owners need to be held to terms of leases and to liveable housing, just as they hold tenants to leases and expect certain behavior.

5. Improve public transit. Jobs go wanting because workers cannot get to them. Workers want jobs, but can’t get to them. There are many people with good skills and abilities but who must share a car or do not have a reliable vehicle. Buses are not just for the ultra-poor and the retired elderly.

6. Strengthen women’s networking for empowerment of women. Many women’s groups exist for networking but few reach out beyond their own members or their own interests or funding streams. The need for women to support women extends beyond those women who are poor, uneducated, and probably pregnant.

7. Work to reduced sprawl. Sprawl increases the price of farmland and makes it harder for new farmers to start up their operations. It also increases air pollution and demands more use of gasoline. It puts peoples in vehicles instead of in public meetings, at restaurants, or talking with their neighbors.

8. Increase the number of people writing letters to editors or suggesting news blog stories.

9. Reduce swearing. This is a personal matter but I have discovered myself swearing way too much as demands upon me increase with resources decreasing. Of course, as I write this on the afternoon of New Year’s Day I find I have already messed up this resolution.

10. Win Powerball jackpot and enter presidential contest late in the year as the victorious fourth party candidate.

M.R. Field is editor of Leading Voices: Iowa.