Are Developers paying too much in Platting Fees? Absolutely NOT!

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If anyone has been paying too much for NEW infrastructure and development, it has been the tax payers of Sioux Falls. When the 2nd Penny sales tax was raised to a full penny over a decade ago to fund infrastructure expansion, the promise was developers would put in 40-60% into that fund in platting fees. That hasn’t happened, not even close. In fact, taxpayers at one point were putting in over 10x more into that fund then the developers.

Well apparently some developers are now crying the platting fees are too much (about $20K per acre on vacant lots in undeveloped areas). Sioux Falls City Councilor Greg Neitzert talked about it in a recent post on his Facebook page. He seemed to be sympathizing with the developer because they used the tired old excuse that they pass those prices to the consumer of the new development. Well duh. The consumer is getting brand new sewer, water, and roads, why shouldn’t they pay the cost? How is charging me extra in sales taxes fair? What do I get out of it except higher taxes and water/sewer rates?

In about 50% of US cities with populations of 25K or more they charge the developer a 100% of the cost of new development infrastructure, so current users are not subsidizing new growth. This makes sense, because as I have often argued, new growth without a plan to pay for it, makes no sense. Slow growth that is properly funded is fiscally responsible to taxpayers. When developers don’t have enough workers to build their developments, that should tell us that maybe the ‘growth’ isn’t needed. Who are you building and expanding for?

I think we should eliminate platting fees all together and have developers instead pay for the entire cost of new infrastructure. If the NEW development is really truly needed, it will pay for itself. That’s just common sense.

Posted in: Developers, Development, Greg Neitzert, Planning Commission, Platting Fees, SF City Council, Sioux Falls

Platting fees way under prediction and November sales way down from 2008

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As you can see the city now is down -4.1% from last year. I suspect that number may rise a little in December because of Christmas sales, but not much.

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And as you can see, taxpayers have put in over 8x more to the arterial road fund then developers have. I found out Monday why this is. Developers used a loophole in platting fee collection. They called their plats ‘Minor’ plats instead of ‘Major’ plats. There should be more about the platting fee story in the SF MSM over the weekend, keep your eyes peeled.

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Posted in: Platting Fees, Sioux Falls, texas

Dave ‘No Shame’ Munson talks about laws, growth and disappearing platting fees

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This morning I saw David Kranz did an interview with Dave Munson, he was sharing some of his wisdom as advice for the next mayor. My suggestion is to do the opposite of everything he has done, and you will be just fine. I’m not sure if Kranz used this as Munson’s first quote in the article so that I could fall out of my chair laughing, but it worked;

“I think my advice to anybody is the same,” Munson said. “Make sure you do things legally. Do the things that are right. Just do what your heart tells you to do so that you can make things better.

Those of us who have followed Munson’s administration know that when King Dave talks about doing things ‘legally’ he means ‘try not to get caught’. During his two terms he has been accused of many violations of State law and city charter, yet no charges have ever been brought up on him, mostly because the people who have accused him of these violations chickenshitted out and didn’t follow through. They include

– Campaign Finance violations

– Approving 100% expenditure increase of Phillips to the Falls of $1.5 million dollars without council consent (violation of city charter)

– Private closed door meetings with developers promising them taxpayer resources (Cherapa Place)

– Stifling free speech at council meetings by threatening arrest and police intimidation

– And recently rewriting an ordinance after the council voted on it (Staggers pointed it out in a council meeting and Munson went beserk on him).

But the Monday morning funnies don’t end there. As I have said before the council has had heated debates about maintaining our current city streets, estimates are that we are close to $100 million behind on them and with close to a Half-billion dollar budget this year, you would think that we would be spending a large chunk on maintenance? Guess again.

Last year, the city stepped up street resurfacing and repairs. But Staggers said the city still is not putting enough of its second-penny sales tax revenues into maintaining streets.

 

“They know people are concerned about the streets,” he said. “We’ve had a street problem for a long time.”

 

Next year’s plan calls for spending $6.3 million on resurfacing existing streets and making other repairs. Last year, the city spent $4.9 million.

That’s right, out of a $500 million dollar budget we spend a measley $4.9 million on resurfacing. What a joke. When we are spending so little, on the streets you would think the city was broke. We will probably spend more then that refurbishing McKennan Park. Like I said, all about priorities.

But it gets better, as we gear up to build these precious arterial streets that the developers have been begging for, their 60% share in the form of platting fees has mysteriously been taken out of the equation, or at least Dave ‘No Shame’ Munson, The Argus or KELO-TV didn’t bother to mention it in their stories even though I tipped them off about it last week;

Mayor Munson says the second penny sales tax will help pay for projects in this growth period. The tax is estimated to bring in about $4 million dollars a year that would go to help developers pay for building new streets, sewers and curbing in new neighborhoods.

Make sure you do things ‘legally’ and if you don’t, mislead, mislead, mislead.

Posted in: Munson, Sioux Falls

Don’t believe the platting fee ‘Ruse’

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We were told a decade ago that when we increased our 2nd penny to a full penny (.092 to .100) that developers would kick in another 50-60% in platting fees to help build arterial roads. That never happened. In fact taxpayers have kicked in around 8 to 10x more (from the .08 increase) than developers have. It really doesn’t generate much at all. When you consider we spend well over $40 million a year on roads in Sioux Falls (it may even be higher than that) platting fees only kicked in around $2.4 million in 2017, most of which came from US in that tax increase.

But there are some that think developers are literally paying to build our arterial roads, they are not, they are contributing, but not paying 100%. That’s why I really don’t understand this statement;

Sioux Falls real estate developer Darrel Viereck was one of the early backers of platting fees a decade ago.  Many developers didn’t want to pay the additional cost.  But Viereck saw the city was poised for a building boom, despite the recession.

When in reality, developers are not really contributing much of anything to our roads fund. But they can keep telling that same old lie.

Makes you wonder if TenHaken’s new COS gently nudged Stormland TV to do this story, or if Darrel was just bitching about something again. Who knows?

Posted in: Platting Fees, Sioux Falls, Taxes