Saturday, August 18, 2012
District Of The Day 3: Iowa Senate District 27, Iowa House District 53 & 54
Registration: D 11323, R 13152, N 15650, total 40147, R +1829
Incumbent: Amanda Ragan, D-Mason City; holdover seat
All quiet here: two unopposed incumbents and a holdover Senator. But it will be interesting in two years, as Ragan has the most Republican Senate seat held by a Democrat (#33 most Democratic). The old district lines gave Ragan a 2500 Democrat voter registration edge. She was re-elected two to one over a weak opponent in 2010.
Ragan keeps Mason City, but her new turf goes south and west instead of north and east. She drops Floyd and Mitchell counties and gains Franklin, the northern part of Butler, and the western, Clear Lake half of Cerro Gordo.
House District 53
Registration: D 7157, R 4654, N 8309, total 20129, D +2503
Incumbent: Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City
Few line changes here as Mason City is almost, but just under, the ideal district size so The District Draws Itself.
This was probably the most Democratic district held by Republicans for most of the 2000s. Bill Schickel moved on to higher party office in 2008 -- wonder how HE'd be doing as state chair? -- and Steckman finally took the seat back for the Dems.She's now solid enough that the GOP isn't trying.
July 19 Campaign Finance Report: Citizens for Sharon Steckman
House District 54
Registration: D 4166, R 8498, N 7341, total 20018, R +4332
Incumbent: Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake
Upmeyer escaped the redistricting triple-up with Stu Iverson and Henry Rayhons, got the dream house at the lake, and along with it nearly 2000 more Republicans. Upmeyer and the district move out of Hancock County to keep western Cerro Gordo, including Clear Lake, and all of Franklin County. The new turf adds northern Butler County from Pat Grassley's district.
Democrats thought they had a late starter here, but that fell through, so Upmeyer can fully concentrate on her leadership duties.
July 19 Campaign Finance Report: Upmeyer for House Madame Leader has a Gronstal-like $249,502.35 in the bank. Now THAT is the kind of number Senate Republicans would like to see out of Jerry Behn.
Senate District 27, House District 53 & 54: District of the Day 1 - 5/31/2011 | District of the Day 2 - 3/16/2012
Friday, March 16, 2012
District Of The Day Reboot: Iowa Senate District 27, Iowa House District 53 & 54
Registration: D 12010, R 13821, N 17607, total 43458, R +1811
Incumbent: Amanda Ragan, D-Mason City; holdover seat
Fellow Democrat Mary Jo Wilhelm's gain is Ragan's loss. Ragan keeps Mason City, but her new turf goes south and west instead of north and east. She drops Floyd and Mitchell counties and gains Franklin, the northern part of Butler, and the western, Clear Lake half of Cerro Gordo.
Ragan won a hurry-up special during the 2002 session and her first full term that fall. The old district lines gave Ragan a 2500 Democrat voter registration edge. Under the new lines that turns into a deficit of 1800. With Tom Rielly's retirement this becomes the most Republican Senate seat held by a Democrat.
The only good news for Ragan is she was just re-elected two to one over a weak opponent in 2010, so she holds over till 2014.
Campaign finance reports: Ragan for Iowa Senate
House District 53
Registration: D 7429, R 5030, N 9380, total 21851, D +2399
Incumbent: Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City
The District Draws Itself: The ideal House district size is 1 percent of the state population. In the 1990s Mason City was just above that size, and got split down Highway 18 to dominate two districts. But in 2000 the population dropped to just 91 people less than the perfect size, and at that point the rules keep cities together and Mason City, exactly, WAS the district.
This decade, the seat adds a township on the north and three on the south plus the city of Rockwall, splitting Cerro Gordo into a vertically striped configuration. But that doesn't change things politically; incumbent Sharon Steckman keeps roughly the same Democratic edge.
This was probably the most Democratic district held by Republicans for most of the 2000s. The representatives for the two halves of town both got paired up in 2002 and both quit. Republican Roger Broers, then in his first term after years on the Board of Supervisors, was expected to run again, but stepped down for health reasons right before the deadline (by election day he had passed away).
Bill Schickel was the late-starting Republican. Democrats attempted to nudge their candidate aside to recruit a stronger candidate for the now-open seat... but the candidate wouldn't be nudged. So Schickel, in a mild upset, won the seat by about 500 votes. The Democrats made two more decent efforts, but were never able to knock him off.
Schickel stepped down in 2008, and is now keeping occupied on the Republican state central committee. As for the district, it finally turned Democratic. Steckman (whose husband had been Schickel's opponent two years earlier) won comfortably. No Republican has filed this year.
Campaign finance reports: Citizens for Sharon Steckman
House District 54
Registration: D 4581, R 8791, N 8227, total 21607, R +4210
Incumbent: Linda Upmeyer, R-Clear Lake
In addition to her new house at the lake, Upmeyer escapes the triple-up with Stu Iverson and Henry Rayhons, gets nearly 2000 more Republicans. Upmeyer and the district move out of Hancock County to keep western Cerro Gordo, including Clear Lake, and all of Franklin County. The new turf adds northern Butler County from Pat Grassley's district.
With no Democratic opponent, Upmeyer can worry less about re-election and more about why her presidential candidate, Newt Gingrich, is tanking.
Campaign finance reports: Upmeyer for House
Original post 5/31/2011 Statewide Map: Front | Back (with City Insets) | Old Senate, House
Wednesday, August 10, 2011
Rayhons running for re-election
Here's one no one figured would happen on Map Day: the guy left standing in the state's only tripled-up legislative district is... Henry Rayhons?!?
The 75 year old Republican legislator has announced for re-election in House District 8.
That seems to complete the musical chairs in the district, which includes all of Hancock and Wright counties and part of Kossuth and has a comfortable GOP edge. House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer has announced her move to House District 54.
The third Republican representative, Stew Iverson, has not announced his plans but is universally assumed to be running in open Senate District 4. Two other SD04 candidates have announced: Democrat Bob Jennings and tea partyish Republican Dennis Guth.
Another legislative announcement: GOP freshman Josh Byrnes is running for a second term in House District 51, which changes a lot and has just a narrow GOP edge. Byrnes won an open seat when Democrat Mark Kuhn stepped down.
Aside on Wisconsin: Taking two seats from the other party ain't a "loss."
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Upmeyer Makes Move Official
This one's been anticipated since Map Day and now it's finally official:
House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer has announced plans to run for re-election in House District 54.My guess is she was just waiting till the end of session, which at the rate it was going could have pushed it dangerously close to the March 2012 filing period.
After redistricting, District 54 is comprised of portions of Cerro Gordo and Butler Counties and all of Franklin County. Upmeyer intends to move to the Clear Lake area to run in, what is essentially, the district she currently represents.
Upmeyer was part of the only triple-up in the whole state in House 8 with fellow Republicans Stewart Iverson and Henry Rayhons. It almost looked like a deal breaker for the whole Map for a few hours. But Iverson is widely expected to run in open Senate District 4. Rayhons, in his mid 70s, could be a retirement, but with Iverson and Upmeyer settled he could decide to stick around.
As for Upmeyer's new district, it's got a better Republican registration edge (+4000) than either her seat from last decade or the one she shared with Iverson and Rayhons. So she can worry less about re-election and more about why her presidential candidate, Newt Gingrich, is tanking. She's chairing his state committee but since the post-vacation cruise staff evacuation, she says her Newt duties are "on the back burner."
A couple months back, TheIowaRepublican was reporting young veteran Gabe Haugland was also interested in 54 on the GOP side; any ammo still in that round?
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
District of the Day: Senate District 27, House Districts 53 and 54

Senate District 27
Registration: D 11714, R 13115, N 16017, total 40865, R+ 1401
Incumbent: Amanda Ragan, D-Mason City
Fellow Democrat Mary Jo Wilhelm's gain is Ragan's loss. Ragan keeps Mason City, but her new turf goes south and west instead of north and east. She drops Floyd and Mitchell counties and gains Franklin, the northern part of Butler, and the western, Clear Lake half of Cerro Gordo.
The old district lines gave Ragan a 2500 Democrat voter registration edge. Under the new lines that turns into a deficit of 1400.
Ragan, 56, won a hurry-up special during the 2002 session and her first full term that fall. The only good news for Ragan is she was just re-elected two to one over a weak opponent in 2010, so she holds over till 2014.
House District 53
Registration: D 7244, R 4642, N 8426, total 20322, D+ 2602
Incumbent: Sharon Steckman, D-Mason City
The Lines Draw Themselves: The ideal House district size is 1 percent of the state population. In the 1990s Mason City was just above that size, and got split down Highway 18 to dominate two districts. But in 2000 the population dropped to just 91 people less than the perfect size, and at that point the rules keep cities together and Mason City WAS the district.
This decade, the seat adds a township on the north and three on the south plus the city of Rockwall, splitting Cerro Gordo into a vertically striped configuration. But that doesn't change things politically; incumbent Sharon Steckman keeps roughly the same Democratic edge.
This was probably the most Democratic district held by Republicans for most of the 2000s. The representatives for the two halves of town both got paired up in 2002 and both quit. Republican Roger Broers, then in his first term after years on the Board of Supervisors, was expected to run again, but stepped down for health reasons right before the deadline (by election day he had passed away).
Bill Schickel was the late-starting Republican. Democrats attempted to nudge their candidate aside to recruit a stronger candidate for the now-open seat... but the candidate wouldn't be nudged. So Schickel, in a mild upset, won the seat by about 500 votes. The Democrats made two more decent efforts, but were never able to knock him off.
Schickel stepped down in 2008, and is now keeping occupied on the Republican state central committee. As for the district, it finally turned Democratic. Steckman (whose husband had been Schickel's opponent two years earlier) won comfortably.
House District 54
Registration: D 4470, R 8473, N 7591, total 20543, R+ 4003
House Majority Leader Linda Upmeyer has her name on this district. She's looking to move to Clear Lake to get out of the triple-up with Stew Iverson and Henry Rayhons.
In addition to a new house Upmeyer would get nearly 2000 more Republicans, and she could safely focus on the duties of leadership like recruiting, fundraising, and campaigning for others.
She and the district would move out of Hancock County to keep western Cerro Gordo, including Clear Lake, and all of Franklin County. The new turf adds northern Butler County from Pat Grassley's district (Grassley of course has his own problems, namely Annette Sweeney, who might have been able to move here if Upmeyer hadn't called dibs).
But complicating matters, Craig Robinson notes: "Gabe Haugland, a dynamic young conservative who has been active in Republican politics and is back from a recent deployment in Afghanistan, wants to run for the Iowa House in House District 54, an open seat that includes Clear Lake, where he lives." It depends on how badly Upmeyer wants to move to the lake and how badly the 75 year old Rayhons wants to stay in office. In any case, with these numbers the Democrats are kind of an afterthought here.
New Map | New Map (Insets) | Old Map
Thursday, April 28, 2011
District of the Day: Senate District 4, House District 7 and 8

Senate District 4
Registration: D 11,890, R 14,602, N 15,880, total 42,381, R+ 2712
No Incumbent
Five whole counties- Emmett, Kossuth, Winnebago, Hancock and Wright-with no senators. This turf was split between Jack Kibbie, Merlin Bartz, and Rob Bacon in the old map. No one county dominates geographically as all are of similar size, between 10,000 and 16,000 population in a 61,000 body district. That's a lot of parades.
Last year Bacon knocked off Democrat Rich Olive, who won in 2006 when Stew Iverson quit his re-elect race after being deposed as Senate Republican leader. Iverson, of course, made a comeback last year when he defeated Six Pack Democrat McKinley Bailey in a Wright-Hamilton district.
Iverson is part of the triple-up in House 8 (see below) which is partially resolved by his likely run in this seat. There's not a lot of overlap between new senate 4 and the old Senate 5 that he held. Wright is the south end of the new seat that borders Minnesota. The old one went south from Wright instead, through Hamilton, wrapped around Ames to take in most of geographic Story, and ended way down at the Polk County line. The old seat was a few hundred voters more Republican, but Olive still managed to squeak through by 61 votes in a Democratic landslide year.
House District 7
Registration: D 6526, R 6405, N 8514, total 21,450, D+ 121
Incumbent: John Wittneben, D-Estherville
Day Four and finally our first House Democrat. Wittneben was one of the D's few bright spots in 2010, holding an open lean-Democratic district by just 32 votes when Marcy Frevert retired. But the new district loses 1200 Democrats to become a swing seat. Wittneben loses the Frevert base of Palo Alto but keeps his own Emmet County base and rural north Kossuth. But significantly, he adds the city of Algona.
House District 8
Registration: D 5364, R 8197, N 7366, total 20931, R+ 2833
Incumbents: Linda Upmeyer, R-Garner, Stew Iverson, R-Clarion, and Henry Rayhons, R-Garner
UPDATE July 14: Upmeyer officially announces move to House 54.
UPDATE August 10: Rayhons staying and running.
For a few hours on March 31, it looked like this was the seat that could have scuttled the whole plan. With Upmeyer and Rayhons both carrying Garner addresses, it would have been hard for the map geeks to keep them apart; Iverson was just one more wrench in the works.
Early reports were that Upmeyer would be the one who stayed, but now it seems she's looking at open House 54 to the north. Rayhons is 75 and was pegged as a retirement, but if Upmeyer does move he could stick around. Iowa Politics offered a good summary on April 20:
Upmeyer has said she might move from her longtime farm in Garner to a condominium in the Clear Lake area. But if she doesn’t, Rayhons said he’ll retire instead of running against his fellow Republican.If Upmeyer stays she gets a slightly more Republican district. She'd lose Winnebago and Worth to the north and east. This seat instead goes south to Iverson's Wright County base and gets southern and western Kossuth, but not the city of Algona.
“It’s going to all depend on what Representative Upmeyer does,” Rayhons told IowaPolitics.com. “I would guess that I would probably run for that House seat if Representative Upmeyer decides to move. However, I will not interject if Representative Upmeyer stays where she is and wants the seat. I would quit the Legislature, probably.”
As for Iverson, speculation is that he might run for a state Senate seat that’s vacant due to redistricting. Iverson is a former Senate majority leader. However, he said Tuesday that he hadn’t made up his mind on his political future.
“I have absolutely made no decisions yet,” Iverson said. “The House district looks pretty good. The Senate district looks pretty good. There happens to be three Republicans in the House district. Representative Upmeyer, Representative Rayhons and I have not sat down. We have not talked about anything. I have to tell you, I’ve made no decisions yet whatsoever, and I probably won’t make a decision until next fall.”
However, Iverson is sure about one thing.
“I am not moving,” he said.
Rayhon's old turf went to the east in Franklin and picked up the Clear Lake part of Cerro Gordo, which is specifically where Upmeyer is taking about moving. Open House 54 could also have been the escape route for Annette Sweeney, who drew the short straw in the pair with Pat Grassley. But it's starting to look like she drew the short straw here, too.
New Map | New Map (Insets) | Old Map