Marilyn 'Mary Jo' Mentzer runs as an independent in Iowa House District 15
Don Harrold, Executive Editor
editor@enterprisepub.com
Marilyn "Mary Jo" Mentzer had not planned to run for anything.
"I never pictured myself ever running for political office, ever," she said.
Mentzer, an independent, is one of four candidates on the Nov. 3 general election ballot for Iowa House District 15, along with Benjamin Schauer, a Democrat; Jason Sherer, a Republican; and Blake Johnson, an independent. The district covers all of Harrison County and part of Pottawattamie County.
She was born in Missouri Valley and graduated from Missouri Valley High School in 1983, the daughter of Joe and Marilyn Mentzer, both lifelong residents of the town. She has worked in real estate for 25 years and teaches continuing education courses for agents. She and her husband moved back to the area during the COVID-19 pandemic when her father became ill; her mother is aging and has medical issues. Between them they have six adult children and three grandchildren. She lives near the Missouri Valley Logan Golf Course.
Her campaign slogan is "Believe in Better," and she traces it to her father.
"He always told me, you know, you might not have much, but the one thing you have is your word," she said. "And if you don't have good word, you can't make a difference."
Mentzer said she started paying close attention to county government in 2024, when she began contesting her own property assessment. That case is still pending before the state Property Assessment Appeal Board in Des Moines. She cited Iowa Code, which provides that property subject to taxation shall be assessed at 100% of its actual value, and defines actual value as the fair and reasonable market value of the property.
It was at a Harrison County Board of Supervisors meeting, she said, that she first heard about contamination at the former Atlas D missile site southeast of Missouri Valley.
"I found out about the contamination. I wanted to learn more. I started studying it," she said. "I became a nerd on it, I guess you would say."
By her account, the site was operational from 1961 to 1964 on 289 acres, was conveyed to Iowa Western Community College in 1971, had its structures demolished in 1988 and was sold to private investors in 2006. Part of the acreage became a residential subdivision. Part of it remains in row crops and cattle. Trichloroethylene, or TCE, a degreaser used to clean missile components, was drained into the ground and reached the aquifer, she said.
"This is not farmers that contaminated the water with nitrates," she said. "This is the government-contaminated water."
Mentzer said 143 residential wells have been tested since TCE was detected in the area in 2013, and that 19 of them came back above five parts per billion, the threshold she said the state treats as the limit for drinking water. She said she has been told by residents in the affected area that some of them continue to drink from wells that tested high, using filtration systems installed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
"That charcoal filter is not going to make it safe," she said.
She said she has spoken with people in the area who have cancer, brain tumors, Parkinson's disease and other neurological illnesses.
"I'm very passionate because we have sick people out there," she said.
Mentzer said she had her own water tested for TCE through the University of Iowa at a cost of $51, and that her wells came back clean.
"We don't have a contamination issue," she said. "I tested my water."
She said the Corps of Engineers sent staff to her home for about two hours roughly a year ago and went through its monitoring work with her, but that the agency's role is narrow.
"They are there to monitor the situation. They are not the complaint department," she said. "They have a limited amount of funding that was set aside by the government to monitor the situation."
Mentzer said she then contacted the Iowa Department of Natural Resources, which told her that changes in state law would be needed to get a better handle on private wells being drilled in the area.
"They said, 'Mary Jo, if you want to really make a change, you need to run for office and use that platform to try to get some legislative changes,'" she said.
Disclosure is her other concern. Mentzer said she has written to real estate regulators and trade associations in Iowa, Nebraska and South Dakota about the area. She previously taught a course for the South Dakota Association of Realtors on contamination and how to disclose it. She said nothing was disclosed to her when she bought her own home.
"It was never disclosed to us," she said. "And it's not disclosed to anybody."
Mentzer links the contamination to her second issue, property taxes. She cited figures she attributed to Iowans for Tax Relief, which measure growth in property tax collections against the combined growth of population and inflation. By those figures, she said, Harrison County stands at 48.8, up from 46.2 a year ago, against a statewide figure of 39.5. Monona County is at 38.9, Mills County at 32.8, Pottawattamie County at 28.9 and Crawford County at 24.7.
"I wanna understand why Harrison County's at 48.8 and the statewide average is 39.5," she said.
She said she met with the Pottawattamie County assessor this month to ask why that county's figure is lower, and came away pointing to its data centers, which she said represent roughly $456 million in assessed value between two facilities.
"Pottawattamie County's able to compress their property tax growth rate because of the data centers," she said.
That is the basis of her proposal. Rather than a moratorium, Mentzer said, Harrison County should consider redesignating the contaminated ground for special use and recruiting data centers to it, buying out affected landowners in the process.
"Data centers don't care if they have water contamination," she said. "They just need the fluid for the coolant."
"It's gonna bring down the tax growth rate," she said. "So it's really a win-win for the community."
Asked whether she is pro data center, she said, "I am pro finding good fits for data centers." She said technology is not going to slow down, and that she does not want American data stored overseas.
Mentzer also said she is running on cancer rates. She said Iowa ranks second nationally and first for new cancers, and that Harrison County ranks fifth among the state's 99 counties, averaging 112 diagnoses and 33 deaths a year.
"Nobody's going to cure cancer," she said. "But we should be looking for where the cancer is coming from and how to pass legislation to stop the cancer."
She said she has visited a retired resident who bought a home in the county in 2005 for $26,000 and has used a credit card and held garage sales to cover the tax bill.
"She's being taxed out of her home," Mentzer said. "And if she loses her home, frankly, I don't know where she's gonna go."
Mentzer said she does not believe property should be taxed on unrealized gains. She also acknowledged that assessing homes at their purchase price would not fix the problem on its own, because levies could be raised to meet budgets.
She was a Republican before this race. She said she contacted county party officials about running for the seat a year ago and could not get a response, and eventually changed her registration.
"I felt like the only way I was going to be able to run was to go and change to an independent," she said.
She set a ceiling of $10,000 on her own campaign spending after being told by current and former officeholders that a House race would take $50,000.
"That is ridiculous," she said. She estimates she has spent about $5,000.
Asked what she would want voters to hear, Mentzer said she would rather they kept their money.
"I would like voters to quit giving money to politicians and pay it forward in their community, because we have people that are hurting, meaning they can't pay their taxes," she said. "So, make your community better and pay it forward and help the people in your community, or use that money for yourself, but quit giving it to politicians."
If elected, she said, she would return calls, texts and emails within 24 hours and come back from Des Moines on weekends to hold open meetings in the district.
"Residents need to know what kind of legislation is coming down the pike and what kind of legislation has been passed," she said. "The good, the bad, and the ugly."
She said the campaign is going well, and that the outcome will not change what she does next.
"I think the thing that people do understand, whether I get elected in office or not, I'm not going away," she said.
Mentzer can be reached at 402-979-1187 or m.mentzerforiowa@gmail.com.
