Meet the Candidates: Elkader City Council

The three candidates who will appear on the ballot for three available seats on the Elkader City Council in the Nov. 4 in city/school elections include Roger Buchholz, Tony Hauber and Curtis Ruhser. The candidates recently shared their thoughts about key issues with Times-Register reporter Kaitlyn Kuehl-Berns. Visit elections.claytoncountyia.gov/ for more information on candidates and when and where to vote.

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Roger Buchholz

Roger Buchholz grew up on a farm in Bremer County before serving in the U.S. Navy and earning his teaching degree. He came to Elkader in 1969 to teach at Central, where he also coached, drove a school bus, taught driver’s education and kept score at sporting events until retiring in 2000. He and his wife, Betty, raised four daughters and have long been active in the community. Buchholz has led several local organizations, including the Elkader Jaycees, Golf Course, Sister Cities, Turkey River Corridor and Peace Church Council, and helped develop Founders Park after the 2008 floods—efforts that earned him Iowa’s Volunteer of the Year award in 2013. He served on the Elkader City Council from 2005 to 2019, stepping down to care for his wife, and now hopes to continue giving back to the community while bringing his years of experience and perspective to the council once again.

Q: What do you think is the biggest issue facing the community, and how would you address it?

A: Elkader has a thriving downtown and we want to continue that growth and also attract and encourage new businesses to areas even outside the downtown area. At present, there are only a couple of empty storefronts downtown, so it’s essential that we look to other areas in the community for development. For example, in the area of Dollar General, Norby’s, etc. Expanding business opportunities in these areas will help strengthen the local economy and keep Elkader growing.

Q: What do you see as the community’s greatest strength, and how would you build on it?

A: Our greatest strength is the unity, pride and involvement of our community. There’s a history here of working together as a whole to support various causes through volunteer work. I plan to lead by example—continuing to volunteer and encouraging others to get involved as well.

Q: How would you set budget priorities for Elkader, and which areas deserve the most focus?

A: The city manager provides strong recommendations regarding the budget, and the council reviews and considers these carefully. It’s essential the council remains informed and actively engaged in these conversations. My priority is to work within the city’s financial limitations while remaining flexible enough to address issues as they arise.

Q: How can Elkader grow while keeping its small-town character? What strategies would you support to attract and retain businesses?

A: Change is inevitable, and if we don’t adapt, we risk losing opportunities in the long run. Tourism is big business in Elkader, and one of things that attracts tourists is our small town charm. Growth and preserving our small-town charm are not mutually exclusive—we can have both. 

I would work with Main Street Elkader and other organizations to promote local businesses and attract new ones. Our industrial park also has great potential and should continue to develop. I strongly believe Elkader would benefit from a hotel, and I have previously worked to help bring one to town. I would continue those efforts to support tourism and economic growth.

Q: What role should the city council play in hearing from residents and representing the community?

A: It is the council’s duty to listen and respond to the needs of residents of Elkader and act in the best interests of the city and its citizens.

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Anthony Hauber

Anthony “Tony” Hauber is an Elkader native and Central graduate. He earned a bachelor’s degree in computer science from Iowa State University and, after spending nearly 10 years in San Francisco, returned to Elkader with his wife, Ketaki. The couple has two children. An entrepreneur and software developer, Hauber has served on the Elkader City Council since 2021. He is also the council liaison to the Main Street Elkader Board and serves on its Organization Committee and Volunteer Task Force.

Q: What do you think is the biggest issue facing the community, and how would you address it?

A: Many would say high property taxes are a pressing issue—and I agree. But high taxes are really a symptom of deeper challenges: limited annexation, aging infrastructure, a lack of commercial development and a housing shortage.

We’re behind on annexation. Many homes and businesses just outside Elkader’s limits benefit from the city but don’t contribute to its tax base. Expanding boundaries would help balance that, allowing those areas to share in both the costs and rewards of long-term investment.

Our infrastructure needs attention, but we’re still paying off bonds for major projects—High Street, Carter Street and bridge repairs. Until those are paid down, we can’t take on much more debt. Yet delaying maintenance only increases costs: in the daily use of inadequate infrastructure, in greater and more expensive repairs and through ongoing inflation. Growing the tax base would give us more flexibility for future investment.

Downtown has been at capacity for years, yet we haven’t planned for additional retail or commercial space. Commercial properties contribute more in taxes, boost tourism and expand local options. Addressing our housing shortage also adds residents who support local businesses and share in funding city services.

While some point to budgeting, the city’s main operating tax rate has stayed stable for a decade. Most of what drives higher property taxes comes from the Employment Benefits Levy (increasing insurance premiums) and Debt Services (from doing capital projects). For these spread levies the city has a cost, and the cost is spread over the tax base evenly. This is why growing the tax base is so important. Our tax base is currently around $50 million, which is more or less the total value of all property in Elkader. I believe with annexation, commercial development and housing development, we could add $10 million to that number. That would reduce all of our spread levies by almost 20% across the board with no negative impact to the budget. In fact, it would actually increase our budget because our general levy would stay the same.

Q: What do you see as the community’s greatest strength, and how would you build on it?

A: Our biggest strength continues to be our people and our community. I’ve lived in cities that have no sense of community, no sense of ownership. We own this town together and the people know that. We should be proud of the bridge you just repaired, for it is ours. Also, we got a reminder of what life would be like without it. You all did that. You rehabilitated something that will be around for another 150 years. If you are like me, I know you believe in small towns. Big cities have things going for them, they attract developers, they verticalize wealth, they can afford redundancy. But they don’t make iron clad communities. What is the value of that to you? How much would you pay to maintain that community? How hard would you work for it? There is no way we will do great things unless we do them together, and our sense of togetherness is our biggest strength.

Q: How would you set budget priorities for Elkader, and which areas deserve the most focus?

A: Budgeting is important and I believe we should continue to invest in our people, but the priority is planning. We need an annexation plan, we need a comprehensive infrastructure plan and we need to continue work on our housing plan. Growing the tax base creates more budget to keep workers’ wages high and hire more staff, and because of spread levies it still lowers property taxes.

Q: How can Elkader grow while keeping its small-town character? What strategies would you support to attract and retain businesses?

A: Developers want to know their investments are safe. They want to invest in communities that invest in themselves. They want to invest in communities that have a plan. We can easily run a town into the ground by stagnating on infrastructure, or by generating debt in services (like the sewer and water) just to save the taxpayers money. Not raising prices to appease people for now is not the answer. If you want a sewer and water system in five years, there is a price it has to be today. We need to continue to make those investments, because we can save a penny this year, and cost us pounds down the road. I believe that’s part of what got us into our current financial situation. 

Q: What role should the city council play in hearing from residents and representing the community?

A: We are simply representatives. Our job is to ingest the problems, find the perspective in the community, weigh those perspectives with plenty of thought and then do what we think is right for the long term of Elkader. From this position, most long-term investments create short -term struggles before the investment flips to being positive. It’s easy to yield to short-term pressures at a long-term cost to the community. We need to keep that in mind as we try to steer our community into the future. We need to bear that out to the citizens.

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Curtis Ruhser

Curtis Ruhser is an Elkader native who moved into town in 1980 after being raised on a farm just north of the community. He and his wife, Kathy, a former Central Community School District teacher, have been married for 39 years. A graduate of Upper Iowa University with a degree in business administration, Ruhser spent 30 years in advertising sales for local newspapers and radio before joining the city of Elkader as deputy clerk in 2019. He plans to retire from that position in December.

Q: Same as previous interviews.

A: The journalist has asked lots of questions about pressing issues facing the community, our strengths, setting budgets, community development and more. Then the questions about how I would plan to solve them. Well, what I might consider necessary or important is not what others on the city council or individuals or groups of people in Elkader would consider necessary or important. Everyone in the community has their own ideas and opinions on these subjects. Some people believe housing growth is only when a developer annexes 30 acres to construct lots of houses or condos. Some people are happy when existing houses are updated or a few new homes are built within the existing city limits. Economic growth isn’t always determined by a major corporation moving into Elkader providing opportunities for employment, it’s also the local entrepreneurs opening new small businesses, creating varied shopping experiences for its citizens and tourists.  I believe the city can assist with information and resources to help them accomplish their goals. 

I have previously been on city council, and it was easy to make and prioritize a list of five-year goals on community housing, infrastructure repair or construction, employee recruitment and retention, budget planning for future purchases and more, but then something always happened and the list of goals needed to be restructured. It’s not always natural disasters such as the past flooding that had high price tags so Elkader could rebuild. It is also the changes in how our city receives funding from the state, or the state creates new laws, and the city needs to restructure the budget to pay for the new mandates. Any major construction project for infrastructure may be bid out in advance, but don’t expect the prices to not go up on materials and labor by the time the project begins and changes in budget or finding additional non-budget funding for the project need to be made. That’s not that I am saying that goal setting is not a necessary tool, it’s just that I’ve seen some goals just get moved down the list quite a few times. Eventually those topics do rise to the top and are given consideration. 

The budget is the tool the council really has the most input in. I was on city council from 2010 through 2019 and have been employed by the city from 2019 through 2025. The city council makes decisions on how these dollars are spent, however, the state also mandates what some of these dollars can only be used for. The city council works with the city clerk and department heads to develop a budget that all departments may receive their fair share. The city has to work with the amount of money it receives from local and state taxes. I know I am paying more for my property taxes than previous years, but the reason for the increase isn’t only the levies that the city, school or county implement, it’s also determined by the assessed value of your property as determined by the county assessor’s office. For example, my home’s net assessed value increased around $47,000 from 2022 to 2025. It follows that your property tax bill is higher. You may not like that, but people still expect a police force actively patrolling the community, streets cleaned and snow removed, a fire department, library services, the swimming pool and parks with recreational equipment to enjoy during the summer, and the list goes on. I will be working with the other city council members to develop an efficient budget so our current services can continue and as some of those goals rise to the top of the list, they can be given consideration, implemented and completed.