Dedication of rooms honors Cedar Rapids employee killed on job

CEDAR RAPIDS - With a conference room full of Water Division employees among those looking on, city officials Monday dedicated two conference rooms to Stephen Cook, an employee who died in an April crash on duty in a city van.

The driver whose truck crashed into Cook's city van is in the Linn County Jail awaiting trial on vehicular homicide charges.

On Monday, Cook's widow, Lisa Wulfekuhle, joined Steve Hershner, the city's utilities director, Mayor Ron Corbett, City Manager Jeff Pomeranz and Water Division employee Gary Thompson in remembering Cook.

Cook had worked in the meter shop and had been with the division more than six years at the time of his death.

Wulfekuhle said Monday's dedication ceremony was more than her husband would have wanted because she said he didn't consider himself a big deal. But he was, she said.

Cook's widow said her husband enjoyed working for the city's Water Division and appreciated his colleagues.

He often came home from work with stories about his workday, she said, stories that ranged from rescuing a stray cat with tattoos from a storm drain to being polite in those times when he had to shut somebody's water service off.

'I can honestly say that I only listened to about half of his stories,” his widow said. 'But with the half stories that I did hear, Cook (she called her husband by his last name) talked about his co-workers as if they have been friends forever.”

The city has placed a decal with Cook's initials, SC, and angel wings on the rear door of each of the meter shop's vans, Hershner said. He said Cook 'was taken far too soon” and is 'incredibly missed.”

Corbett said Cook also had been a volunteer firefighter in Palo who had coached Little League.

Pomeranz said he only had lost one or two other city employees in his 35-year career in four different cities as a city manager. He called it 'your absolute nightmare” to lose someone on the job.

'Every day, as employees gather in this building and as visitors and officials come here, you guys can really feel proud that this is the Steve Cook conference room,” Pomeranz told the gathering of city employees.

'It is a room that will help remember Steve's memory every single day.”

Cook's widow and his parents, Donald and Karen Cook of Ryan, unveiled a plaque to be placed on the conference room wall.

His son, Lucky, and other relatives were present.

Julie Carson, an appraiser in the city Assessor's Office, presented a check to Cook's widow for $5,500, which Carson said started as a small fundraiser in her office and grew among city employees.

Wulfekuhle thanked the city for the dedication 'and for making regular work days an experience to tell your family about.”

Lawson Chadwick, 47, whose truck crashed into Cook's city van in April, is to appear in court Wednesday.

Chadwick's defense is seeking a change of venue for his trial.

Chadwick is charged with homicide by vehicle while under the influence of methamphetamine and amphetamine, homicide by vehicle while attempting to elude, and homicide by vehicle by reckless driving. Each is accompanied by a habitual offender charge.