I just sent off this email to the council and mayor;
I do however want to thank councilors Jamison, Staggers and Anderson Jr. for realizing Tuesday night’s decision to vote YES was an easy decision when you stand up for democratic values and take an oath to uphold the US Constitution. The rest of you failed to recognize your constitutional duties, and just how easy they are. The Spring snowgate election SHOULD have been a slam dunk.
As for those of you who ignored the wishes of over 8,000 petition signers, I have no idea where to begin.
Why don’t we start with your ginned up false arguments and scripted questions to city directors (Karsky). One of your main arguments was hiring contractors in January for the following snow season. You say if we approve snowgates in the Spring of 2013 it would be after the hiring of contractors in January. So how is the timing of a Spring election in 2014 any different?
Your other fine argument against the election was that there was no way that 60 well-informed snowgate volunteers could educate the public on snowgates in 5 months. I was flabbergasted by this statement. The public only got 3 months to decide on the Events Center, one of the largest projects voters have ever approved. Do you think an army of 60 IGNORANT MORONS could collect 8,000 signatures in 10 short weeks? Do you think they did this blindly with no knowledge of how snowgates work? Councilor Erpenbach’s statement was condescending and quite frankly insulting. I have heard councilors and mayors say a lot of things over the past 10 years to constituents in public meetings, but that statement took the cake Michelle, it was over the top and downright mean spirited. You owe us a public apology.
I will direct this last part at council chair Erpenbach and mayor Huether. You can laud transparency all you want but I’m sorry Mike, just saying something doesn’t make it so. Limiting public testimony to 20 minutes and making up the rule before the meeting started without informing your fellow councilors was blatant CENSORSHIP! There is NOTHING transparent about CENSORSHIP. While there is plenty I could say about Michelle’s role in this censorship, Mike had the power to override Michelle’s concocted rule. That is why, since Tuesday I have been doing research on Robert’s Rules, censorship, the 1st Amendment and limiting FREE speech. Stifling public testimony on such an important topic was a disservice to the 8,000 petition signers, and will not be tolerated in the future. I will be using my research and resources to make sure of this.
Your lust for greed, power, control and self interest is what forced you all to vote NO on Tuesday. I feel sorry for all of you. You have only made this city and country weaker by your decisions. A democracy is only successful when it is ran by the people and for the people.
Regretfully,
Sure glad Mike is running for Governor. I wonder how he is feeling about having 70% of Sioux Falls voting against him. Let’s see how many average town voters will be sucked into more of his lies.
There is a lot I could say. Don’t even know where to start. This council has had a lot of low points, but Tuesday night was a new low. Let’s start with this – council leadership (Erpenbach specifically) has to go. I’ve been watching weekly as she bullies councilors, citizens, and frankly anyone she doesn’t agree with. I’ve watched various new ‘rules’ be put into place that are frankly pulled out her rear end. It can be pretty well summed up as follows – if she agrees with your point of view, you are granted wide latitude and unlimited time. If she disagrees with your point of view, you are limited to 2 question rules, time limits for public input, you are snickered at, hurried, bullied, and intimidated. There is no tolerance for diversity of opinion. Either you agree or you are to be quiet, sit down, and shut up. Period. The other thing that aggravates me is how the rest of the council sit their like potted plants and takes it. Obviously a lot don’t really have to care or even are OK with it, because they seem to find dissenting viewpoints an annoyance too. It’s very disheartening when a majority of the council obviously don’t care what their constituents thinks. What you heard Tuesday night was we know better than you. I’m sure if 80,000 signatures were gathered nothing would have changed. They had their minds made up and the opinion and desires of the citizens are nothing to cast aside. Anyone who watches these meetings knows those arguments were total garbage. Concern that we need time to get informed? We didn’t wait on the event center election. And that was a far bigger issue. And we would have had 5 months. Concerned about cost? You weren’t concerned about bonding 100% of the event center, you aren’t concerned about 20 million dollars plus operating costs of a indoor pool you’re giddy to push through, you weren’t worried about budgets for a water feature at Cherapa, endless river greenway funding, tennis and hockey facilities, the list goes on and on. This council has never been concerned about the cost of anything. There has been zero regard for the taxpayer or budget restraint and now suddenly its a concern? Please. It’s all a smoke screen. I still go back to the language of the petition. It said used “from and after 2013”. It couldn’t have been more clear what the desire of the signers was. They had legal grounds to wait, but in spirit and on principal it was totally unacceptable. I think the only positive thing that came from Tuesday night is now a lot more people probably (should) know what those of us who watch the council closely know. The majority are not interested in your opinion. They don’t represent you. The majority on the council has a major problem with being arrogant and out of touch. I’m not really sure what we can do about it in the short term. It’s discouraging when you know those who are supposed to represent you don’t. Once again, this wasn’t about snow gates. It was about honoring the will of the voters who you claim to represent. Period.
Nicely said Greg
You are simply wrong. The petitions have now already been certified and an elecion called. They cannot go back and find a problem with them now. Secondly even if the Council writes a statute to their liking it won’t trump or undercut the action required by your petition or negate the election. This is now set in stone. You will get to have your election on your proposed action. You say the folks who voted for the 2014 election ignored democracy and the us consitution while you know for a fact that the sd constitution clearly says the council can wait until 2014 to hold the election. You are just mad you didn’t get your way. Put your energy towards something more productive and positive.
PW- Have you read the initiative? I think this line clearly states when the election should be held;
“The City of Sioux Falls shall use snow gates or other devices to prevent snow, in an amount that prevents usual access, from being plowed or placed into driveways or their openings to public streets from and after November 1, 2013. ”
So how do we get snowgates in use by Nov 1, 2013, if the election isn’t until Spring of 2014. Pat, thanks for trying to defend the dis-information campaign brought on by this council.
http://www.southdacola.com/blog/2012/09/snowgate-petition-drive-meeting-7-pm-thursday-night/
I also got a call from a councilor (NOT one of the cowardly 5) And he said that Tuesday night was ‘disgusting.’
Huether sent me this tidbit this morning;
“ALL OF THE COUNCILORS were notified about the managing the debate time or “20 minute conversation†at 1:47pm on Monday. ”
Let’s suppose this is true, it may be, but why all of sudden we are changing the public input rules before each meeting depending on the topic.
You’ve said it well. I’d like to add that the topic was whether to have a vote not if/when/how gates would be implemented. City officials had an hour discussing snowgate negatives without a follow up rebuttal. It will take another state supreme court case before the state will step in and supervise ordinances meant to acknowledge citizens and democracy.
The state can take control of city government. After numerous constitutional violations, it’s long overdue.
West river hates Huether. He’s alienated Sioux Falls voters. He’ll never be governor. He should be mayor a second term because the muni bond scandal can be uncovered and prosecuted by then. I’d love to see him do hard time in federal prison for public funds fraud.
I wonder in practice how these arbitrary rules are put in place for a given meeting. For example, do the chair (Erpenbach) and vice-chair (Entenman) simply decide we’ll have to 20 minutes of input on the snow gates resolution, then send an email out to the rest of the council and the Mayor, and the rest just accept it? Is the Mayor asserting that whatever the council leadership tells him, he must abide by it? I’m just curious. Is anyone pushing back?
Yes. One councilor is doing his research on public testimony.
Funny how on Event Center night they allowed every fool in the area to endlessly babble on how we “need” that waste of taxpayer money…culminating in that embarrassing moment when BabyGirl Huether spoke. Now they only gave you 20 minutes? Incredible.
I can understand having some limitations, but they need to be reasonable AND should be applied to all topics. You can’t turn the meeting into a pep rally for one topic and then try to toss the next one into a back alley. 20 minutes is not nearly enough time. Make it 60-90 minutes…and make Craig Lloyd’s weekly handout come after that. It should cost him something to get what he wants.
Great letter L3wis. Too bad some of them don’t actually give a darn.
Wow… All that immaturity and pettiness over shoveling a driveway a few times a year. I agree with the petition process but YOU do not dictate when we hold elections on issues. Your petition will be voted on in a timely manner according to election laws.
Let me guess, you were hoping that this would be on the school board election because few (but the elderly, your target audience) would show to vote no. And now it will be held during a mid term and more tax payers will show. Nice try.
L3wis, regarding the public testimony and first amendment issues, are you suggesting the councilors should place no restrictions on your speech? What limits would you approve of and how should the council balance the voice of the citizens against productive meetings that won’t drag on for six or eight hours?
LJL regardless of your stance on the issue, can you really claim 16 months is timely?
I think we all know the reason the councilors are delaying is because they are bitter the citizens are making them look foolish by essentially proving to them that the priorities of the council are somewhat out of whack from the priorities of the citizens.
Huge events center? Check. Millions in TIFs handed out like party favors? Check. Landscaping along the river under the guise of community development? Sure. Pickle ball courts… why not? But when the public asks for something that ALL would benefit from as opposed to a select few? Heck… can’t have that without three or four years of testing and at least two different city councils offering their viewpoints right?
So lets get mad and begin petitions that outlaw TIFS and paying for all this ^@%cking wealthy welfare… No… We look like jackasses because we get unruly about petty shit like this. I don’t want to pay more in taxes because some are too lazy to shovel the end of the driveway just as much as I don’t want to pay more for Lousy Loyd TIFs.
WE are all the “electorate” and WE all look stupid when this is the big topic that leads the headlines. Loyd received another TIF while you were bitching about snow piles
GOOD GRIEF.
Let’s see there were about 50 – 60 citizens there to witness vote. Probably 10 would have spoken at 5 minutes each, there could have been 50 minutes used by an eager public. Instead we saw grandstanding by 5 ignorant / ill-infor med councilors reading scripts prepared by city hall.
The scripts had nothing to do with the limits put on the public. There was to be limited discussion of the election and not SubPrime’s budgeting process.
I agree that 20 minutes of input in absolutely dog shit. I think it’s about time that we say if they give us 20 minutes to talk then they will have 20 minutes to discuss. If they need more time than they will have to give another 20 minutes to the citizens before continuing. Now that’s something I can vote for.
Dissent leads to revolution. Has it become time to put a democratic charter on the ballot? Home Rule charter hasn’t worked and ordinance revisions have turned the city into a dictatorship. If there were 8400 people for Snowgates, there could be three times that for charter change.
How many people in Sioux Falls would be willing to start a movement to change our local government back to the council mayor format or to a city manager format?
I have never been a huge fan of city mangers running our cities but it is becoming apparent we need to do something.
We really only need the 5005 signatures to force a vote, we did get 8300 signers. Looking over the city clerks spreadsheet shows some inconsistency in formula. If there had been a fight over the number os signers, she could have been overruled. What a cluster.
Lewis, maybe we should think about it… What do you think the city ‘leaders’ would do to have the system totally pulled out from under them?
As my Ron Paul friends would say: “It’s a Republic.”
Mr. E, I don’t vote in Sioux Falls but I might just reregister to vote against all 5 of those cowardly individuals. For the next 18 months you need to keep the heat on. I say you should film the driveways of these heinous public servants and see if the plow drivers are coerced to plow them better. I mean that. I bet you the plow drivers are ordered to plow them better.
Diamond Jim has gotten so many sweetheart deals before he was councilor, it is not even funny.
What business is each of the 5 councilor in? I’ve thought of buying a Harley. I know I’ll not buy or service it here.
It’s not a republic. It became a dictatorship in 2004 when the city denied citizens due process to appeal into court. The mayor has the power to overrule a councillor vote. There’s no method for recalling a mayor. There’s no method to make a complaint against police. They’ve become the mayor’s Gestapo. City civil procedures are not recognized by the ststr or feds. They directly violate 2 amendments to the US constitution. They were ordered to comply and amend ordinances. They’ve refused and present government has had no legal authority for 2 years.
We need a new democratic form of government because we’re unrepresented. Home Rule charter can be replaced or revoked. When citizens petition & vote, the state will come in to assist. We might even save some of the bond money before 5 councilors and the mayor get it into offshore banks.