Born: Ottumwa, Iowa

Family: Husband, Thomas; older daughter, Bethany, lives in Iowa City, Iowa, with her husband, Tim, and works as a trauma nurse at University of Iowa Hospitals; and younger daughter, Morgan, lives with Teresa and Thomas in Basehor, along with her 3-year old daughter, Layla, and works as a nurse tech at Kansas University Hospital. Both daughters are working toward degrees in the medical field. Tim and Bethany have a 4-year-old daughter, Norah. 

Occupation: Administrative assistant at the city of Tonganoxie. Bastron works on various day-to-day operations and provides customer service.

Dream job: Park Ranger. Bastron always has loved the outdoors and working with people. Her favorite vacation spot is The Boundary Waters and Canoe Area Wilderness in northern Minnesota and Canada. She has hiked, portaged and paddled there about eight times. 

Interesting fact: She went to high school with actor Tom Arnold.

“He has always been funny and the center of attention,” she said.

Digging deeper: Bastron graduated from Drake University in Des Moines, Iowa. She has a bachelor’s degree in education, and has a teaching license with the state of Iowa. Later, she worked for 16 years in real estate and mortgage, 10 years as a training consultant and technical mortgage consultant at Principal Financial Group and six years as a licensed real estate agent for Iowa Realty. She worked as a project manager for multiple housing projects and sales of those projects.

She later had the opportunity to relocate to Kansas with her husband’s job. He works as a regional director of lodging operations for IHG Army Hotels, so he works out of Fort Leavenworth. They moved to Kansas in 2013 and bought a home in Basehor. She said she “loves the short commute to work, the people I get to meet every day, the history and small-town feel of Tonganoxie and the variety of work in City Hall.”