Retirement

Cedar County Assessor will retire this week

HARTINGTON – A new county assessor will be ringing in the new year.

County Assessor Becky Dresden submitted her resignation to the Cedar County Board of Commissioners last week. Her last day will be Thursday, Jan. 2.

She had given a year’s notice, making her intentions known and setting her retirement date back in December 2023.

“Since last December, we’ve been working for a smooth transition. There’s a lot to turn over,” Dresden said.

The county board conducted interviews of longtime assessor’s office employees Janelle Heikes and Marla Wortmann to fill the role since they are both certified to be assessors. They selected Heikes who will be officially appointed to the role Friday, Jan. 3.

The assessor’s office will be hiring another person to backfill Heikes’ position in the office.

Dresden vacates the assessor’s office after working there for 33 years, in the head role as assessor since 2022. She was appointed after Jeff Curry resigned that year and then ran unopposed in the 2022 election.

She said she’s looking forward to spending more time with her family, especially her 17 grandkids and nine great-grandkids with two more great-grands on the way.

“I want to get to their ball games and stuff so I just decided it was time,” she said.

In 30 years, she’s experienced many changes.

The two most significant changes that stand out are moving the assessor’s office to the new courthouse addition and also the introduction of a computerized assessment system. “It was all completed by hand, maps with dots on it and you counted the dots for the number of acres. It’s way easier now,” she said. Although she’s been planning for her retirement for a year, it’s still difficult to leave behind three decades of working with helpful staff and an understanding public, she said.

Assessors aren’t the most popular county officials, Dresden said.

After all, the assessor’s office sets property values and ultimately affects how much taxpayers pay in property tax.

“Once they understand what our guidelines are, people have been really understanding,” Dresden said. “I’ll miss all the people - people that I worked with for so many years. Everybody’s always really good to work with and I thank them for their support and understanding.”