I sent this letter to the Argue Endorser, they rejected as I suspected with their usual excuse, TOO LONG;
I have watched the events center debate from the beginning, and city government in the same amount of time. I could tell you things that would make your head spin and your hair stand on your back. But since this is being printed in a newspaper that would rather hide controversy, I won’t go there.
There is many topics about the events center that have not been addressed or addressed too much but I will skip over the daily drum beat.
One topic that has not been addressed is funding. Sure, we throw ideas out there like horseshoes at the family picnic, but no one really cares where uncle Bob’s shoe lands. We can discuss bonds, higher entertainment taxes or even parking fees, but it really comes down to private donations if voters are willing to approve it.
As a citizen said at the Mayor’s ‘Listening and Learning’ session on March 26, 2011,
“in order to have any chance at all on a bond issue, you gotta have a wider community effort, the people that profit from this proposed events center should get some skin in the game.”
I think most regular Joes are like me, willing to sacrifice a bit if the big wheels are willing to give a little to.
Cricket, Cricket, Chirp, Chirp.
That’s the sound you hear from them.
It amazes me that they are the first to be in line in their freshly pressed suits to beg and plea for taxpayer bailouts at council meetings, while cracking jokes about Joe Six-Pack in the Carnegie Hall public bathroom (remember the 2nd penny getting raised to the full 2% to build roads for developers? One of the main supporters was making fun of Joe six-pack in the restroom, that night, and I heard it all).
They love it when the hardworking people of Sioux Falls supplement their incomes, but where are they when a big project like an Events Center needs their support? Hiding under a rock with their hands on their wallets like a bunch of cheap, greedy, cowards.
Do I support a new events center? Sure, on two conditions; the majority votes to support it and the elites open their checkbooks. Otherwise the whole plan can go to Hell.