WATERLOO - A self-employed electronics repairman is preparing to make his second straight bid for the Waterloo mayor's job.
This time, 54-year-old Craig Hundley will be starting his campaign with name recognition.
"Last time nobody even knew who I was, and I pulled almost 20 percent of the vote," Hundley said. "It was a surprise to me, when I was expecting only 8 to 9 percent."
Since that 2005 election, when Hundley finished third behind incumbent Tim Hurley and former Mayor John Rooff, he has been actively watching local government.
"I've written a lot of letters to the editor related to speeding and wasteful spending," he said. "I wasn't going to run again, but I've been getting a lot of calls, and I'm being encouraged by a lot of different people."
Hundley, who owns and operates Iowa Rebuilt Electronics in Waterloo, is the first person to announce his candidacy for the Nov. 6 mayoral election. Two-term incumbent Tim Hurley has yet to reveal whether he will seek a third term.
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"The highlight of my campaign is certainly going to be to cut wasteful spending," said Hundley, noting he gets plenty of ideas while watching City Council meetings each week on the local government access channel.
"The other thing I really want to bring is less formal council meetings - council meetings that John Q. Citizen with a high school education can understand," he said. "Evansdale and Cedar Falls have informal council meetings, and I think it creates a more comfortable atmosphere of not being intimidated by seven suits."
Hundley said he also supports an idea put forth by a current councilman that failed to garner support to pass.
"One of the things I'm absolutely in favor of was Harold Getty's wanting to have at-large council seats representing the east and west sides," he said. "I think it's an excellent idea for unifying the two parts of the city into one, and I wish it was my idea."
Hundley also is going on record as opposing the Elk Run Energy Station, a coal-fired power plant on the city's northeast side.
"That's the big question I keep getting," he said. "I really thought about this hard."
Hundley said the 90 jobs to be created and the level of tax base increase from the plant is not worth the amount of contaminating mercury that will be released from the plant into the local environment.
"The city is about more than bringing money into the tax base," he said. "It's about quality of life. Ninety jobs are not a very good return for what we're losing in quality of life."
Hundley also said he supports strong public safety and hopes to clean up gang-infested areas, possibly using eminent domain to raze crack houses.
"I want to look out for citizens 20 years down the road," he said. "I think the current administration looks a year or two down the road. My ideas are looking out for the next generation of people who want to make Waterloo their home."
Hundley was laid off from John Deere in 1980 and worked for the state of Nevada before returning to his home in 1998. He is a graduate of DeVry University, with a major in electronics, and worked for nine years as a volunteer firefighter while in Nevada.
Candidates for city offices can file nomination petitions with the City Clerk's Office from Aug. 27 through Sept. 20.
Contact Tim Jamison at (319) 291-1577 or tim.jamison@wcfcourier.com.
