IOWA CITY (Iowa) — Iowa’s eighth largest city, Waterloo, reelected its first Black mayor. Three Black candidates were also elected to City Council. This will be the first time in history that the city has a majority of Black residents.
After a campaign marked by bitter debates about policing in the city, where less that 17% of the roughly 67.300 residents are Black, Tuesday’s historic election result was historic.
Quentin Hart was Waterloo’s first Black mayor in 2015. He won a fourth term for the city’s leadership by defeating Margaret Klein, a white challenger who ran as a champion for the police.
Three Black newcomers to the City Council — John Chiles, a music educator, and Nia Wilder, a pharmacist, and Ray Feuss, a white incumbent — won the four seats. Cedar Valley Backs the Blue endorsed all four of the defeated candidates. This political action committee was formed in May to oppose Hart’s reelection bid and support “pro-law enforcement” candidates.
This means that four out of seven council members will be Black. It could also help Joel Fitzgerald, the first Black chief of police in the city, to keep the job he took over last year. Klein supported Fitzgerald and called for him to resign.
Critics accused Hart of being misinformed and racist in order to portray Hart as someone who opposes law enforcement and is allowing crime spiral out of control.
Hart stated that “This community chose to work together, a messaging of unity, a hope message and a love message for the city, not just division” and spoke to The Associated Press by telephone on Wednesday. He acknowledged that the campaign had taken a toll on Hart and his family.
Hart claimed that he and his friends celebrated Tuesday by dancing to “This is how We Do It” by Montell Jordan. This song featured prominently in one attack he received. Hart made a video last year of himself singing the song in a contest. The “Back the Blue” group used the clip to attack Hart for being a wannabe rapper.
Hart grew up in Waterloo and said that he had never seen a day when Black people would be a majority in city leadership. He called it “incredible” as well as “landmark” because of his qualifications and vision for the city.
“Yes, they are African Americans but they are amazing, smart, and talented and have something to give to the city. Hart stated that expectations are high.
Hart received 58% of the votes against Klein, out of 13,400 ballots. Klein, a former Catholic school worker, was a two-term City Council Member and congratulated Hart. She also noted that her campaign had been significantly outspent.
Lynn Moeller, the chairman for “Back the Blue”, did not respond to a request for comment. The normally vocal group posted on Facebook that they had only heard from the voters and that it was time to “move forward”.
Retired officers formed the group to criticize the city’s decision not to remove the long-standing emblem of the police department — a mythical winged creature called a griffin, that was worn on officers’ uniforms since 1960.
Critics claimed that the emblem evoked fear in the Black community for years due to its similarity to a Ku Klux Klan Dragon. The police union and others who wanted to keep it, including the police union said that it was a symbol for vigilance and not racism.
They also claimed that officers were at an all time low in morale, noting that many had resigned to pursue other jobs, and blaming Fitzgerald who was previously the Fort Worth police chief. Fitzgerald has made many changes to department policies since taking over the Waterloo position to improve relations with the community and hold officers to higher standards. Fitzgerald described the attacks as racially motivated.
Hart supported Fitzgerald by stating that the department uses a popular community-policing approach to traffic stops, which promotes “decency” and respect.
Nichols, one the newly elected council members wrote on his campaign site that he saw himself among the many Black men shot by police officers and that he used to fear making late-night medication deliveries to patients out of fear of danger.
He wrote, “My vision of public safety is that all Waterloo residents will know that our public security service will be there when we need it.”
