Uber absent from Iowa City months after recruiting drivers

IOWA CITY - Several months after social media recruitment postings for drivers by Uber started showing up, the company is nowhere to be seen in Iowa City.

'We really haven't had communication with Uber staff since late November, early December,” said Simon Andrew, administrative assistant in the city manager's office.

Uber brands itself as a technology company that connects riders with drivers via a cellphone application. It's similar to a taxicab, but no money is exchanged as riders pay with a credit card through the app. Drivers are paid a flat rate by the company and use their own vehicles and gas. The service launched in two Iowa cities in 2014, including in Cedar Rapids in early December.

Iowa City officials started talking with Uber representatives in September, around the same time the company began using ads on sites like Facebook to recruit drivers.

'They did communicate to city council some concerns they had [with proposed ordinances],” Andrew said. 'That's the last communication we as a city have had with them.”

The city has proposed several new ordinances that would affect Uber drivers as part of an overall revamp of the city's current taxicab laws. The ordinances would require Uber drivers to register with the city and place a city issued decal on their personal car. In a November letter to the city, Uber objected to both of those requirements.

In a statement from a company spokesperson, Uber said the proposed ordinances, in their current state, would prevent it from operating in the city. It added the company hoped the city council makes changes to it and offered to discuss the differences between ride-sharing and traditional taxi service with city officials.