Marion's Infrastructure, 1950s to Present

by Eugene O. Frye

(Mr. Frye served on the Marion City Council from 1958-62 and from 1965-68. He reported on Marion City Council meetings for the Marion Times from January to October, 1998. The writer is grateful to Ralph R. Mills, retired Marion City Engineer, for refreshing his memory and for providing additional insights on many of the items described below.)

INTRODUCTION

Marion's city government of the 1950's consisted mainly of a number of mostly well-meaning part time amateurs feeling their way toward managing a rapidly-growing small city, with little help from other levels of government, while today's city government appears to be a well-oiled professional machine handling the continuing growth of Marion in a reasonably orderly fashion, but having to cope with the increasing demands of State and Federal governments. This article traces many of the key developments in the evolution of Marion's infrastructure from then to now.

THE 1950'S SITUATION

In late 1956 when the writer came to Marion with his family, the city had just emerged from a period of dormancy extending over several decades, and growth was essentially being thrust upon it. Marion had suffered a number of economic blows, including losing the county seat to Cedar Rapids in the 1920's, and the Milwaukee Rail Road moving its division headquarters to Perry, IA in the mid 50's.

In spite of these losses, Marion remained an attractive place to live and to raise a family. This was recognized by many of the new employees coming into the area to work with the expanding Collins Radio Company and other Cedar Rapids firms. Marion had virtually no industry then, and was almost completely residential in character but with good supporting retail establishments.

The town fathers of the time realized that the growth that was happening needed to be controlled, and one of the first steps was to establish a Planning and Zoning Commission in the mid-1950's. P&Z quickly zoned the city and started requiring new developments to come in with substantial improvements such as paved streets and acceptable sewer and water facilities. Another major event was the City's purchase of the decrepit private water system, and its continuing improvements of the system. Building codes were also being enacted.

Not too many years later a young veterinarian named Victor Klopfenstein moved to Marion and started his practice here; he is currently Mayor of Marion.

THE 1950'S CITY GOVERNMENT

The city government of the 1950's was the classic Mayor-City Council form, with these all being part-time positions. As is today, there was a councilperson representing each of the four wards and two councilpersons elected at large. The Mayor's duties included serving as Police Court Judge handling traffic offenses and other misdemeanors. All terms were for two years. The city offices were located in the old court house on 11th. St. between 5th. and 6th. Avenues, which was demolished several years ago to prepare the site for the new city library.

There was no central administrator, thus the Council and Mayor had to manage actively many city functions as well as to set policy. While it was possible for councilpersons to have a full-time job or business in addition to serving on the Council, the time requirements on the Mayor were such that realistically only retired or semi-retired persons could serve effectively in that office.

Fortunately, when the Division Headquarters of the Milwaukee Road was moved out of the area in 1955, two very capable people stayed in Marion and contributed a great deal to the development of the city. Merwen Taylor became the City Clerk and brought a much-needed professionalism to that office. He had the skills necessary to structure the City Clerk's operations to cope with Marion's growth. Ralph Mills signed on as Marion's first full-time City Engineer and worked hard to cause the City's development to become more orderly and to bring the infrastructure up to date.

THE 1950'S INFRASTRUCTURE

The infrastructure of the city in the 1950's was in poor condition, and was barely coping with the residential growth of the city. While the growing population was good for the local businesses, there was a realization that unless controlled properly, the growth would shortly become a liability to existing taxpayers. Some developments were coming in without paved streets or sidewalks, the City's waste water treatment plant was overloaded, and the recently-purchased water system was in poor shape.

A Water Board consisting of Fritz Sorg (who later served several terms in the Iowa Legislature), Norman Waffle and Paul Rose was appointed to administer the water system, with City Engineer Ralph Mills working for the Board part time. The Board improved the water system rapidly, and as a matter of policy extended water service to wherever it was needed to support industrial and residential growth.

The several-person Police Department operated out of two rooms in the City Hall under the leadership of Police Chief Leighton Ford. There was a one-cell jail, primarily for overnight holding, located within City Hall.

The Fire Department, under Chief James Reynolds was housed in a building that stood on the north side of Seventh Avenue between 9th. and 10th. Streets. The site is now a parking lot. The quarters were extremely cramped and inefficient. Personnel were mostly volunteer, with two or three professionals. Much of the equipment was actually owned by Marion Township under a cooperative arrangement for fire protection.

The City's waste water treatment plant and sanitary landfill were located near the east bank of Indian Creek in what now is Hanna Park. This treatment plant had been designed for a smaller city and was now overburdened regularly; the water quality below the treatment plant was not good. There probably were not many (if any) fish in Indian Creek at that time. The problem was aggravated by large infiltrations of storm waters (both intentional and unintentional) into the sanitary sewer system, which often required bypassing the treatment plant. The sanitary landfill was being operated pretty much in accordance with the standards of the time.

THE 1950'S FINANCING

In this time period there was very little money available from the State and Federal governments. There were essentially no grants, and the major infusion of tax money was from the Iowa Road Use Tax Fund, (Mainly from state gasoline taxes and vehicle licensing fees) of which the municipalities of Iowa received a whole 10% of the net that was prorated on the basis of population. This just about covered maintenance of existing streets, and did not allow much if any new construction from public monies. This was the main reason city streets at that time were generally in pretty bad shape. Nearly all of the city's funds were raised from property taxes, bond sales and special assessments on various projects, mainly construction of new streets.

Also at this time, the schools were supported primarily from property taxes. The various "Property Tax Relief" measures were just being initiated.

THE 1950'S AND 1960'S CONFLICTS

The major conflicts of this time period related to land use, new housing developments and new construction. While the builders and developers focused on minimizing costs, the City was concerned that new buildings with inadequate supporting infrastructure would result in existing taxpayers being forced to pick up the costs associated with bringing the infrastructure up to acceptable standards. As a result, every attempt by the city to require more robustly constructed streets streets and sewers in new developments was met with considerable opposition. Sidewalks were another contentious issue. It took nearly ten years of on-going effort before developers were forced to install sidewalks in new developments. Residential lot sizes were another issue that was debated hotly.

One development-related bone of contention was the use of "Orangeburg" pipe between the residence and the public sewer. Orangeburg, a bituminous product, was considerably cheaper and easier to install than the traditional vitrified clay pipe, hence there was considerable pressure to allow its use. However, Orangeburg (thought by some to be made of tar and feathers) did not have a good track record for reliability, thus the City did not want it used. Continuing pressure by the builders prevailed, and its use was allowed for a couple of years before it became clear (it was used heavily in Cedar Rapids) that it was not an acceptable product as a permanent sewer connection.

Another conflict was the persistent desire of some to build in the flood plain of Indian Creek. City officials resisted these requests because of the long-term problems such buildings would present as a result of inevitable floods.

Thinking on the recently-completed Marion Bypass was started over 40 years ago. At that time it was evident that the development of the area between Cedar Rapids and Marion would ultimately require such a highway, and before 1960, the Marion City Engineer and others attempted to get the Iowa Highway Commission (now the Iowa Department of Transportation) to designate a route for the bypass so that appropriate land use controls to protect the route from development could be imposed, but did not have much luck. The IDOT did eventually designate an approximate route, and the developers did honor that route quite well. Meanwhile, many Marion merchants, and at one time the Chamber of Commerce, came out against the bypass in fear that taking much of the through traffic off of seventh Avenue would reduce their business.

WORKING THE PROBLEMS OF THE 1950'S AND 1960'S

Other than upgrading the municipal water system, the most pressing problem to be faced was that of the badly-overburdened waste water treatment plant. Because of the relatively low water flow of Indian Creek as compared to the Cedar River, state and federal regulations in effect at the time would require an extremely high level of treatment for the waste water before discharge, and hence an expensive plant. (Current regulations require a high level of treatment regardless of circumstances) Because Indian Creek flows through both Cedar Rapids and Marion, and Cedar Rapids was having trouble serving parts of its southeast side, the Howard R. Green Engineering Company proposed that a sewer line be laid all the way from Marion down to the confluence of Indian Creek and the Cedar River and a large waste water treatment plant be constructed near there to handle both Marion's and Cedar Rapids' sewage. After considerable negotiations, both cities agreed to go ahead with a plan in which Marion would build its portion of the main sewer line, purchase a fraction of the new waste water treatment plant and share in the operating costs on a pro-rated basis. After an agreement was reached, it was necessary to get the Iowa Legislature's permission to engage in such a cooperative project, which was eventually obtained. Construction started immediately, and the facility was in operation a year or so later.

Time has proven that the cooperative sewer arrangement was a master stroke in supporting the expansion of both Marion and Cedar Rapids. Also, the City of Hiawatha taps in to the Marion line at the confluence of Indian and Dry creeks. An immediate result was that Indian Creek quickly returned to once again becoming a nice stream supporting many forms of aquatic life, and being a real asset to the area.

Now that the old waste water treatment plant and the land fill operation were no longer needed, what to do with this unsightly area? It is believed it was the City Engineer who suggested that it be turned into a park, and that is what happened. Hanna Park is now a jewel, and shows what can be done with a little creative thinking and good community support.

Upgrading the street system was another high-priority problem. Some housing developments had come in without paved streets, and the increasing traffic due to Marion's rapid growth was forcing improvements to be made. Unfortunately, the small amount of State money coming in from the Road Use

Tax Fund would only cover maintenance and very little new street construction. As a result, residential street improvements had to be funded largely from special assessments to benefiting property owners. These assessments could be substantial ($1000-$2000 in 1960 dollars was typical) and clearly hurt some people very seriously financially. It was a bad situation, and the annual paving hearings were contentious affairs. The good part of this was that the City Council was motivated highly to require developers to provide good streets in their developments.

The problem of building in the Indian Creek flood plain was solved pretty well by the city acquiring most of these lands for park purposes.

Parking in the business district was becoming more and more of a problem, in spite of the district's advantage of being long and narrow. It was clear that the citizens of Marion did not want parking meters, but something had to be done. The downtown merchants, working with the City officials, devised a plan to purchase underused areas between seventh and eighth avenues, and turn them into parking lots for their customers. The plan was implemented, and has provided a good solution to the downtown parking problem for customers.

The old fire station on Seventh Avenue simply had to be replaced. A bond issue to do so was turned town by the voters in the early 1960's, but a subsequent one in the mid-1960's did pass and the fire station at Eighth Ave. and 6th. St. was constructed. This relieved the fire station space problem for about 20 years.

In the early 1960's, it became more evident that the increasing complexity of the city's affairs would require some kind of top-level professional management, for the mayor and council were putting in very long hours in what were supposed to be part-time positions. After considerable soul-searching, the Mayor and Council agreed to try a "weak" form of City Manager government in which the regular elected officials remained in place, but hired a professional City Manager. Ralph Potter was Marion's mayor at the time; he subsequently served several terms in the Iowa Senate. The first of the Managers was Peter Crivaro, who had been Assistant City Clerk in Des Moines. Naturally, there were some conflicts in getting used to this new arrangement, but it did not take long to show that this was a step in the right direction, for it allowed the part-time mayor and council to work much more effectively. "Pete" was City manager for about four years before returning to Des Moines, and ultimately becoming its mayor; he died in office there.

THE SITUATION OF THE 1990'S

The momentum that started in the 1950's has carried through to this day. The City's growth during this period has increased steadily, and the government and infrastructure has expanded appropriately to support this growth.

In the early 1980's it became necessary to construct a new police station specifically designed for law enforcement work. A new station was constructed on Katz Drive on land that was essentially donated by Henry and Burt Katz. It was put into service in 1984.

The city outgrew its single fire station in the late 1980's, and a bond issue was passed in 1990 for a new station to be located on Katz Drive next to the police station, again on land made available by the Katz's. Fire Station No. 2 became operational in the fall of 1992.

Another recent significant infrastructure addition is the new Nancy Miller Marion Public Library, which opened several years ago, and should serve the city well for many years to come.

But all has not gone smoothly. A good example is the brief (and considered by some to be disastrous) flirtation with a network of one-way streets in the downtown area. While the aim was to expedite traffic, the net result was that it was slowed, and access to the merchants was hindered. Then there were a few City Managers who just plain did not work out.

The writer believes that one of the great strengths of Marion has been the willingness of many of its talented citizens not only to participate actively in all levels of city government, but also to become involved in other community affairs. While some projects and bond issues have been turned down by the voters, well-thought out and needed ones have almost always been passed.

• Linn County History
• Marion's First Bank
• Marion DAR
• Cary Club Records, 1883-1980
• Cherry Sisters
• State Library of Iowa
• Historical Societies in Iowa
• Nat'l Register of Historic Places
• Iowa Genealogy

• Granger House
• African American Historical Museum
• Brucemore
• CR Museum of Art
• Czech & Slovak Museum
• Duffy's Collectible Cars
• The History Center
• Masonic Library & Museum
• Paramount Theatre
• Ushers Ferry Historic Village