Iowa House District 1, Scholten vs. Steinhoff

Scholten, who spent this past summer pitching for the Sioux City Explorers and has worked as a paralegal, served on the committees for agriculture, commerce, economic growth and technology, and natural resources. He said he sees overlap between the ball diamond and the legislature.

“It’s so comparable because you get people from different backgrounds, you have all these different personalities, all these different experiences, put into one place. And you try to work for the common good to get a win,” Scholten said.

Steinhoff has worked as a teacher for 14 years (largely in the Sioux City School District) and coached a baseball team at Headid field for about 10 years which he called one of the most enjoyable things he’s ever done. 

“My first year at Hunt I just saw some students who needed something positive and I basically started calling around and got ahold of Headid and they said: Yeah, let’s try this out. And it was just cool. It was a big blessing in my life and I hope a lot of children’s and family’s lives.”

District 1 encompasses a sizable chunk of Sioux City going as far east as Floyd Boulevard, as far west as River Drive as far north as Deer Hills Drive and as far south as the Missouri River. 

The Journal sat down with both candidates to chat about some of the biggest issues in the district. Comments have been edited for clarity and length. The full chat is available at siouxcityjournal.com and on The Sioux City Journal app.

Scholten: Continue unfinished business. It was very difficult being down there in my first term seeing Republicans dismantle the AEAs, go after public schools with the voucher program and going after reproductive freedom. We’re at the point now where the general feel is like: This isn’t the Iowa we grew up in and it’s hard to have a front-row seat to all that.

Steinhoff: My family and I, we’ve gotten more involved politically since probably the 2016 election and so much so that just this last February we went to the caucus and then got elected delegates to the Woodbury County Republican Convention. And while there one of the representatives for like the Sergeant Bluff area stood up and said he was hoping to find someone to run for our District 1 area. And my wife and I, when it was over, just kind of looked at each other and said: ‘This might be you.’ But, at the same time, it’s nothing I’ve ever thought of before. It’s not like I dreamed of being a politician but we spent about a week or so praying about it and I’m here. Felt called to pursue it.

Steinhoff: I really like Iowa. I’ve lived here all the years of my life and just want to protect it from outside influences and keep it a good, safe place for families to live.

Scholten: The voucher program is the most fiscally irresponsible bill to ever happen in the state. So making sure that we have fully funded public schools, that should be a number one priority … The AEAs … what was proposed and what ended up happening were so radical. I think the number I saw last was we had 425 less people working at AEAs than they did a year ago. The needs are still there … And then just making sure women have full access to health care.

Scholten: Governor Reynolds, if she really wanted to say no to it, it would be done. I mean, we’ve seen that with every other thing. And the fact that she knows it’s extremely unpopular she won’t publicly say yes to it … If she really wanted to not have this she would say: No, this is not good for Iowa. It’s well documented that the people who benefit from this are Bruce Rastetter and who does he give money to? Kim Reynolds. And a lot of Republicans.

Steinhoff: I’ve been focusing most of my energy on being able to get door to door and making sure that I’m still teaching and all those things but the way I shake out is at this point: I’m not for eminent domain. I for sure want to know more but I’m a strong believer in property rights.   

Steinhoff: Yes and no. I don’t think I fully understand everything about it or the full impact that it might have. I want to see how it’s going to play out here over the next couple years.  

Scholten: It was chaotic and unnecessary … There’s a theme. I just got a text from a friend who’s a professor at a college and she joined their DEI group and they were trying to navigate the new law around DEI at state universities and she goes: It’s complicated. We don’t understand what we can and can’t do. AEA people have reached out to me and they don’t fully understand what they can and cannot do. Librarians have reached out to me because they don’t know what they can and cannot do. OBGYNs have reached out to me because they can’t figure out, they don’t necessarily know, what they can and cannot do. All these laws that have radically changed the state. It has left people who do the actual work not knowing what they can and cannot do.

Scholten: It’s tough for legislators because what policy can solve this? Probably there’s not one specific policy but are there things that we should be doing to make sure that kids are protected in every single way and absolutely … I feel like the laws in the state of Iowa are becoming so relaxed. It is just getting more and more dangerous and it’s just the wrong direction for the state.

Steinhoff: I mean the way I understand it is the law is giving the school boards permission to decide whether they want to do that or not. I like that school boards get a choice especially some of these small rural schools that might be a long ways away.   

The Journal recently reported on the use of Educational Savings Accounts in our region in the first school year. From what you’ve read or been able to keep tabs on, how would you assess the ESAs.

Steinhoff: I mean I definitely like parents having options. And as far as what I’ve noticed in classes at Irving and Hunt the numbers that have left have been very small.

Scholten: So it’s our understanding it is on pace to be 400% over budget in a few years. And, again, there’s no cap on it. There’s no mandatory reporting. All this money is going to a third party, out-of-state entity. And then now we have for-profit charter schools coming in this state … So I think the voucher system, like I mentioned before, is the most fiscally irresponsible bill ever to pass in Iowa. 

How do you feel about how residents are taxed in the state? Too high? Too low? About right?

Scholten: Everybody hates paying taxes. The reality is that it depends what you get for your buck. The thing that I’ve seen at the Capitol and the national is: Who are we taxing? Because one of the issues I see is when billionaires have to pay less taxes than a teacher, that is wrong.

Steinhoff: I’m gonna say it’s fine.

What’s the best way for the state to balance environmental concerns and health concerns with agricultural concerns?

Steinhoff: I really probably don’t have a whole lot to say about it at this point in time. It’s kind of tricky because we do want to keep people safe but we have a lot of industry that depends on such things and people that depend upon the food that’s produced from it as well. 

Scholten: To me, it gets back to: We got to find a way that works with all of us. Part of like the nitrate runoff, farmers don’t want stuff to run off their fields because that’s money they’ve wasted. So let’s work on implementing buffer strips. Let’s implement technology that’s out there that can help us be a little bit more precise with all this. 

Iowa’s state law now regarding abortion bans most procedures after about six weeks. Is that the right amount of weeks, should it be fewer weeks? More weeks?

Scholten: I think there’s also just a level of frustration of the extremism. You have Brenna Bird saying where they went with the six-week abortion ban, that’s not enough. They need to do more. I believe that my opponent doesn’t have a website, that I know of, but his questionnaire on Iowa Right to Life mentions that he doesn’t believe in exceptions like rape and incest when it comes to abortion. Like all those are just extreme, extreme positions.  

Steinhoff: I think it was a good spot.