Vernon, Olson, Poe win C.R. Council seats

CEDAR RAPIDS - Claiming positive campaigns made the difference, Monica Vernon, Ann Poe and Scott Olson won election to the nine-member City Council.

The victors were led by City Council incumbent Vernon, the council's mayor pro tem, who easily brushed aside a 19-year-old Kirkwood Community College student to win a second four-year term.

Vernon won 64 percent (2,958 votes) of the District 2 vote and Taylor Nelson, 27.7 percent (1,279), with perennial candidate Paul T. Larson getting 7.4 percent (341).

Poe, who was the Rebuild Iowa Office's liaison to Cedar Rapids for nearly three years after the city's June 2008 flood, won easily as well, getting 55.6 percent (9,424) of the vote, while opponents Carl Cortez won 22.6 percent (3,665) and Justin Wasson, 22.4 percent (3,635).

The most dramatic of the victories was in west-side District 4, where Olson won 50.37 percent of the vote, barely winning the necessary majority to avoid a Dec. 6 runoff election. His vote total of 1,793 appeared to be 13 votes more than needed to avoid the runoff.

His opponents were Cloyd Robinson, 20 percent (700 votes); Steven Rhodes, 19 percent (671); and Jean Leaf, 10 percent (359).

“Wow,” said an overjoyed Olson, who narrowly lost the race for Cedar Rapids mayor in 2005. “That's cutting it pretty close.”

“I'm thrilled at my age and with my years in this great city to represent District 4 and the citizens of Cedar Rapids the next four years,” Olson, 65, said. “I've worked hard, I've had a great campaign committee and I had great endorsements from labor, the Chamber of Commerce and The Gazette.”

Vernon, 54, said her victory showed that residents of District 2 believe that the community has made a lot of progress since the 2008 flood.

“And I'm going to work and finish the job,” Vernon said. “I think voters recognize that I do what it takes and I'll do what's right.”

Vernon said the third victor in the Tuesday election, at-large winner Poe, said it best during the campaign when she said that Cedar Rapids should lock arms as one positive community and build a better city.

“It's really Cedar Rapids rebuilding against the world,” Vernon said.

Poe, 58, said she is delighted and excited about the victory and said she was proud of the way she and her supporters went about the campaign.

“It was a positive campaign, it was about issues and about moving our community forward,” Poe said. “I really believe that the people of Cedar Rapids really want us to continue the work of recovery. … I'm just so proud of Cedar Rapids, and I'm speechless.”

Vernon and Olson mentioned the hard edges of a campaign that at the end featured robo-calls to constituents that they said were negative and not truthful.

“I think we want a climate where we do check our facts and do tell the truth,” Vernon said.

Olson said his campaign remained positive throughout “because that's what I think we need,” he said. “We need to look at the negatives, but we can't let the negatives take over our lives.”

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