City of Sioux Falls Top Ten Wins

I won’t comment on any of these, okay, maybe I will. In summary I will say that some of these are great accomplishments (that already happened a few years ago), some of them are stalemate, some are flat out false, and some are just fluff, smoke and mirrors.

1. Our new Events Center rocks! The Denny Sanford PREMIER Center opened on time, under budget, pumps out cash, and (yes) has plenty of parking.
2. Sioux Falls citizens want progress, and the April 8 election proved it! Sioux Falls residents overwhelmingly supported the indoor aquatic center at Spellerberg Park, the Shape Places Zoning Ordinance, commercial zoning at 85th Street and Minnesota Avenue, snow gates, and public servants who get things done.
3. It’s the economy, and oh my, ours is booming! In Sioux Falls, good jobs are everywhere, there is record-breaking construction again, our piggybank is fatter, sales tax revenues are sky-high, and in the north, south, east, west, and downtown, our residents are living, working, playing, and thriving.
4. City government is being run like a business, including implementing innovative and long-overdue technology systems like the EnerGov land management system, the Munis payroll system, and a new public computer reservation and printing system at Siouxland Libraries.
5. One of the best community health providers in the nation is in Sioux Falls, and America knows it. Falls Community Health is now directed in-house by City employee caregivers and leadership and has received Patient-Centered Medical Home Level 3 recognition. The Health Department also provided strong leadership and due diligence in our search for an ambulance service provider.
6. The City of Sioux Falls streamlined our approach to Code Enforcement. Being a good and responsible neighbor is a big deal here!
7. More needs to be done, but Public Transportation is more sustainable due to tough decisions being made. Demand has never been higher, but reality is that it is extremely expensive. This city is not shying away from the challenge.
8. Railyard relocation in Downtown Sioux Falls moves one major step forward. The independent appraisal is done so negotiations between BNSF and the City of Sioux Falls can begin to capture almost ten acres of land in the heart of our city.
9. The City’s Legal Team has never been stronger. These public servants are defenders of progress and liberty and are saving Sioux Falls taxpayers millions.
10. Sioux Falls homes and businesses are now protected from a 100-year flood event. The flood control system is complete and accredited and long-awaited development opportunities are on the horizon.

MY REVIEW

1) I have actually heard positive things about the parking at the EC. Many have said to me there isn’t any hassles. And I will agree that it is generating cash flow, to be expected from a new facility, and dare I say, needed. But getting the place done on time and on budget has caused many problems (some we can see like the bad siding and cracked floors) some we cannot, time will only tell how these problems are solved. Also, the ticketing procedures need to be fixed, because lets face it, we cannot continue down the path we have been going so far, and management telling us that ‘there is nothing they can do’ is hogwash. Our council can take action, and pass some simple ordinances to make tickets more available and affordable to the public. But that would require them to ‘do something’.

2) I will agree, I was shocked by the results of the election, but I am not all the way sold that it went off without a hitch. There was too many irregularities (like the undervotes, confusing ballot language, advocational presentations, super precincts and the mayor winning all the precincts except one). There were issues, and I hope the county election review commission digs into this a little and gives us some insight. We may not be able to change the results of the election, but we can do better in the future.

3) The low unemployment is a good thing, and I think eventually it will help to raise wages in Sioux Falls when employers run out of other options. Because while business is doing well in Sioux Falls, pay inequality is rampid, don’t believe me, just ask one of the parents who have kids attending our schools and the almost half that are getting free and reduced lunches, or our expanding food banks and homeless shelters.

4) I will give props to our libraries, they haven’t been run better in years, and they are a fantastic resource for our community, recently adding education programs free of charge. I will also commend the city on being more efficient with managing software, but we have a long way to go with efficiency. I wouldn’t be so quick though to attribute this to running the city like a business. Businesses are set up to make a profit, government is set up to provide us services. Besides, many of these updated programs were in the process of transition before our current mayor was even in office, much like the success of Downtown. We must become more transparent with the public, or at least fill our councilors in on what is going on at city hall, this should be Job #1 of government.

5) Bravo to the community health center for this accomplishment. I would even go as far as saying this should be #1 on this list. This is one thing good local governments do for their citizens, provide affordable healthcare to those who need it. But throwing in the ambulance service to this accomplishment is a bit premature. This will end up in court, most likely.

6) When they talk about streamlining it, do they mean changing the rules in the middle of the game to exempt the city from the same rules we have to abide by? Our code enforcement office main duty right now is vengence. It needs to be dismantled, or better yet, our city council needs to take a hard look at all of the codes on the books and start to take an axe to some of them. Some people in the attorney’s office and code enforcement office also need to receive pink slips. If we really want to say code enforcement is a success we should design it around citizen customer service instead of vendetta. We need to work with our neighbors, not punish them. The irony is that this approach would save the taxpayers of this city millions in legal fees.

7) Cutting paratransit was a knife in the back of many hardworking people in our community with disabilities. I would go even farther and say it was one of the most gutless things I have seen our municipal government do in years. It was dispicable and surely not deserving of a win. The irony of it is that it will have a much larger economic impact on our community when these people don’t have means to get to work, larger then any money we are saving by cutting the program. It certainly doesn’t take a visionary to see that, but it does require having a heart . . .

8) A project cloaked in secrecy and controversy. But hey, we are getting it done, we just can’t tell you how. Little does the public know that behind the scenes a chess game is being played with all the property adjacent to tracks and the discussion surrounds reversion (the rumor is the railroads have a federal easement, they don’t really OWN anything). I have a feeling this one won’t be on the list next year, or the year after that.

9) I almost fell out of my chair laughing when I heard the mayor recite this one (I might have even shed a tear). The fact is the city attorney’s office is not doing their jobs (defending the city charter, State Constitution and US Constitution). That is the main duty of our legal team, not acting as personal attorneys to certain politicians. As for saving us money, that couldn’t be farther from the truth, they are attempting to prosecute the innocent, and losing in court, quite frequently. Do you think there is NO charge when you lose in court, quite the contrary. Just look at the EC siding debacle, that is going to end up costing us a lot of money, win or lose, because someone made a stupid decision in the name of value.

10) While it is a great accomplishment, the levees were completed years ago, this is an old news story. The only thing keeping this afloat is that FEMA is finally changing the mapping. The irony, while it is great we got paid back for our expense for building the levees, we are disguising the money as ‘cash’ and spending it on entertainment (on a rust free indoor pool 🙂

As you can see, this list contains many positive things, but citizens must always be vigilant and peel back the layers. Sometimes that takes a sharp scalpel, but today, it simply took a really big scoop shovel.

Stay tuned for South DaCola’s top 10 wins of 2014.