116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
I grew up on a farm outside of Garrison in Benton County. It was a typical small family farm with a few hundred acres that my Dad, Stuart Gulick, had bought before I was born. My mom, Margaret Gulick, worked as a legal secretary until the farm could support the family when she became the farm’s bookkeeper and traditional farm wife. My parents often worked side-by-side to complete farm chores and raise my sister and me. My parents instilled in my sister and me the need to volunteer in the community through their examples. They weren’t politically active and voted as independents, voting for the person rather than the party. The Garrison School that I attended through fifth grade had 18 students divided evenly between boys and girls. Due to the school consolidation trend, Garrison schools merged with Vinton schools, and I graduated in a class of 140. After high school, I planned to become a math teacher and coach. I enrolled at the University of Northern Iowa, but changed my career path. I switched my major to Recreation Administration with a minor in business. Jobs in this field were scarce in the early 1980s. I accepted a graduate assistant position with the Iowa Parks and Recreation Association. My job was to travel around the state, speaking to community leaders about the advantages of parks and recreation programs and running Amateur Softball Association softball tournaments. In my role with the association, I also put my business minor to use, handling all the financials, from paying bills to payroll and creating financial statements. During this time, I furthered my education by earning a master’s in Recreation Education from the University of Iowa. After moving to Cedar Rapids in 1980, I met and married my wife, Deb in 1983. There was little opportunity to advance in the parks and recreation field unless I moved out of Iowa, but my wife, a CPA, had a good job in Cedar Rapids. I decided to go into consulting, and for that, I needed an accounting degree. Soon after my first child was born, I quit my full-time job and enrolled at Coe College. With my minor in business, it only took a summer and two semesters before I graduated with a bachelor’s degree in Accounting from Coe College in 1986. I have been a Certified Public Accountant since 1988. I worked for several companies as an accountant, manager, and CFO for 16 years. In 1999, I was offered a job with a startup, which was eventually acquired by McCleodUSA. I began teaching at the college level, first teaching auditing at the University of Iowa in 2002 and then entrepreneurial finance at the University of Northern Iowa. I later taught financial reporting to non-finance majors in the master’s in Health Administration program. I truly loved teaching. My wife and I raised our son and daughter, grew our careers, and started Entrepreneurial Services Group LLC in 2002 to provide outsourced executive accounting solutions to small and medium-sized organizations. As we focused on serving clients and building the business, we always made time to get involved in our community. I volunteered on the board of Goodwill Industries as its treasurer for 10 years. We were active in the Chamber of Commerce on the membership and government relations committees. I felt compelled to do more to build a robust local economy. During my 10 months in the Leadership for Five Seasons program, I began to think seriously about running for public office. At the time, Cedar Rapids was the last city in Iowa with a commission form of government. Operating a business full-time meant running for a full-time office wasn’t doable. Then in 2005, Cedar Rapids citizens voted to adopt a home rule council-manager form of government. I ran for the District 1 seat and was elected. From 2006 to 2017, I was a member of a City Council that supported an “Open for Business” policy. I worked to grow the local economy through sound oversight, careful investment, and prioritizing community success. I served on the City Council before and after the disastrous floods of 2008. I was driven to lead the city and region not only to recover but to thrive post-flood. As a council member, I was active with the Iowa League of Cities. I am a Certified Elected Municipal Officer and served as president of the Iowa League of Cities and on the National League of Cities executive board. In those roles, I was exposed to leaders from around the state and country and discovered their ideas, successes, and failures so that I could replicate their successful achievements locally. I was also active with the Kaufman Foundation, which helps support programs that increase entrepreneurship. I sold my business in 2017. In 2018, as a part time CFO I joined EdgeData a startup company in Cedar Rapids that provides artificial intelligence software solutions for wind turbine blades. I serve on the Entrepreneurial Development Center board, the Greater Cedar Rapids Economic Alliance Innovation Council and am currently the Treasurer for The History Center. I continue to manage the family farm. My family has grown to include four grandchildren all living in Eastern Iowa. I am running for State Senate because I see a need for Cedar Rapids, Hiawatha and Robins to have representation in Des Moines in the majority party. I know the decisions I will make in Des Moines will affect not only area residents but also my grandchildren for years to come.
1. Workforce 2. Education 3. Economic Growth We have a major workforce shortage issue in the state that we need to continue to address. This issue alone impacts so many areas of our economy and is tied to the other important issues we need to address as a state. Access and affordability of childcare can help with the workforce issue. Working in collaboration with the private sector we need to take steps to provide incentives for childcare facilities so that they can adequately pay their staff yet make it affordable. While this is more a federal issue, the Dependent Care Flexible Spending account limits have not been changed in decades and this needs to be increased. Access and affordability of childcare alone does not resolve the workforce challenges. We need a strong education system to supply a workforce trained in the jobs of today and the future. Any changes Iowa makes to funding its schools must be based on programs that have a solid track record of success. We need to ensure that our educational system provides the best level of outcomes for all students so they can achieve their highest potential. We need to grow our population in the state. To attract people to work in Iowa, we must create communities where they want to live and work. Investing in public amenities, infrastructure, and housing initiatives can make this happen. We need to find ways to creatively finance housing for workers. This can and should be a public/private partnership to assist developers with housing so that it can be affordable. Lastly, none of the above can be accomplished without continuing to grow our economy by helping retain and attract businesses with good-paying jobs.
We need to work to increase Medicaid reimbursement rates in the state. The low rates lead to several issues of access and affordability of services in the state. We also need to increase our funding for mental health services especially for youth. If we don’t deal with youth mental health issues early on it will cost far more in the future. Costs for education continue to rise so we need to make sure that our educational system is adequately funded so that it can achieve the best outcomes for students. We need to continue to fund our infrastructure. Deferring maintenance will result in much higher costs in the future.
Yes. Traffic crashes are a leading cause of death in our country. Using a hand-held mobile device causes distracted driving, which in turn leads to crashes. Many states have already banned the use. With the technology now available, I believe it is time that the state strongly enforces a hands-free mobile device policy for drivers.
As mentioned earlier workforce is a challenge in all industries and nursing homes are experiencing the same issue. In the case of nursing homes working to increase Medicaid reimbursement rates could help to address staffing and wage rates for staff. More staff increases the safety as well.
Yes, resources need to be directed towards screening and prevention as well as into causes. Cancer research is being done throughout the country so I think focusing resources toward prevention and screening is the best use of state funding.
Provide resources for incentives, cost share, etc. for proven water quality programs. Specific to the agriculture industry, farmers do not want their nutrients nor soil running off from their land. I can not only talk the talk but walk the walk as well. On my family farm I have taken numerous steps to reduce runoff including establishing riparian buffer strips, cover crops and additional tree plantings.
Increases to Medicaid reimbursement rates need to be improved. This will help improve access and affordability. Consideration should also be given to providing a tuition credit for professionals who stay in the state after graduation. Effectiveness is difficult to measure without ongoing discussions with family members of those being treated. Some mental illnesses are not ever cured but need to be continuously treated. Through my discussions with mental health care professionals, they believe the most objective ways to measure effectiveness are access and affordability. Additionally, kids mental health needs to be a focus of services in Iowa. It will cause many more issues in the future if we don’t address this issue early.
First and foremost, we should provide education, family planning, and readily available access to contraception so we can help Iowans avoid unwanted pregnancies. IVF should be easily accessible, affordable and should be something that is covered by health insurance. I do not support our current abortion law which I find too restrictive and unreasonable. I was on the record as supporting our previous longstanding laws and the reproductive rights they provided. I respect those that believe further restrictions should be made as well as those that feel our laws are too restrictive. Regardless of my personal beliefs, any further restrictions or loosening of restrictions should be determined by the vote of the people of the state of Iowa rather than any legislative or judicial governmental action.
I absolutely would not support a bill defining life at conception. My belief is that some form of life begins at conception, but my personal beliefs should not be forced upon others by me or through legislation.
I have talked to numerous teachers, school board members and administrators. Teachers, time and time again, say that they need more time teaching students in the classroom. I believe we need to increase the number of teaching days. This does not necessarily mean the need to increase teacher contract days. We also need to provide more flexibility to the local school boards and administrations in how schools can use their funding. Not every school is the same nor has the same needs so there needs to be flexibility to meet those needs. I don’t believe it is the legislature’s role to set curriculum standards as they are not educational professionals. Parents in collaboration with teachers and school boards at the local level should be the ones making these determinations. There should be an appeals process established that allows parents to appeal decisions by a school board up through the channels of the state school board of education and department of education.
We need to provide communities with the resources and assistance in building out quality of life amenities that will help attract people to live in their community. We need to invest in our infrastructure. Roads, bridges and other infrastructure improvements are needed both by residents as well as our businesses. We need to continue working to retain existing businesses and attract new businesses, both of which are needed to create good paying jobs for our residents. Lastly but most importantly we need to make sure that our education system provides the best opportunity to set our youth up for successful lives in our state.
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