Storm Lake City Council seats were up for re-election this year. This year’s candidates included two members of the Buena Vista University community.  

One of those candidates was Dalton Walker, Classroom and Event Support Coordinator, at BVU. Walker has lived in Storm Lake his whole life in his ancestral home by the lake. He attended both private and public schools in Storm Lake where he was involved in sports, theater, speech, music and community service through the Boy Scouts where he achieved the rank of Eagle Scout. After high school, Walker went to BVU before working at Storm Lake United. Walker would then go on to work for the radio station doing digital marketing prior to working at the university where he is now.  

There are several things that make the Storm Lake community important to Walker, “We have such a unique ecosystem in Storm Lake,” Walker said. “I had my first real glimpse of the amazing diverse background that Storm Lake has when I went to public school for the first time…  I had a lot of friends that had a different background than me so that opened up my eyes to everything that was going on in the world… the diversity in Storm Lake is what is just so cool.” 

Walker chose to run because of the current political climate and because of his dad.  

“My father served on city council from 2007 to 2015… He asked me if I wanted to run and my initial answer was no,” Walker said. “But he said you have to do the stuff that’s hard when you’re young so that you get that experience and you can improve the world in different ways.”  

Walker decided to run after motivation from his father and some inward reflection.  

Another BVU community member that ran for city council was Richard Riner. Riner is the Associate Professor of Criminology and Criminal Justice at BVU. Riner graduated with his PhD in 2017 when he saw a job opportunity in Storm Lake at BVU to be a professor. That led Riner and his family to Storm Lake from Arkansas. Riner worked 10 years as a law enforcement officer prior to teaching at BVU.  

 Riner believes that a person should be invested in where they live. He decided to run when he found out that no one else had stepped up to run.  

“I had heard from my wife, who is also a professor here, that no one had stepped up to run,” Riner said. “And this was the day before the papers are due… I was flabbergasted.”  

Riner explained how Storm Lake is a town of almost 11,000 people, and not one person had decided to step up.  

“One of the things that I do wherever I am is filling needs and there was a need for someone to run,” Riner said. “So, I talked to my wife about it and she encouraged me… It’s part of being invested in wherever you are living your life.”   

Riner believes that if you have the opportunity to serve, it is your civic responsibility to do so.  

“I have an intimate understanding of the realities of law enforcement and what law enforcement officers do,” Riner added. “I already have a really good working relationship with Chris Cole the chief.”  

Riner’s relationship with Storm Lake law enforcement has given BVU criminology students opportunities for community outreach and community policing.  

“I have an understanding of policy analysis, being able to create a way, devise a way… to look at if the policies we have in place doing what we are wanting them to do,” Riner said. “In my PhD program, we talked a lot about policy analysis and trying to figure out what’s working and why.”  

Riner expressed a focus on keeping the revenue streams that work for the city and reevaluating the ones that don’t. 

“We need to find ways we can get the most bang for our buck,” he said. “We need to focus on the things we need to do before we can focus on things we want to do.”  

With Riner being part of both the BVU community and Storm Lake as a whole, he also comes with a different background than other candidates.  

He referenced a term he learned from Professor of Political Science Dr. Bradley Best: the “town and gown” divide between college campuses and their surrounding communities. Riner believes that gap can be bridged through greater community-mindedness among BVU students.

“We have two entities that kind of circle each other but never really connect on a deeper level… both parties and kind of missing out,” Riner said.  

Beavers in the Storm Lake City Council can bring benefits to the BVU community and city community alike. This election may set a precedent that BVU faculty and staff members should be involved in city politics because of the connection it can bring between the university and Storm Lake.  

In the final tally, Riner won his race with 404 votes, edging out Walker, who received 393 votes. The other council seat remained with incumbent Maggie Martinez, who finished ahead of all candidates with 502 votes.