Lots of odds and ends going on at the city council meeting this next Tuesday.
• In item #1, approval of contracts, we are paying about $71K for a land purchase agreement. That’s a whole lot of cashola to draw up a purchase agreement.
• Items #15-17, Badlands Pawn is asking for a malt beverage license, a liquor license and, you guessed it, video lottery terminals. BIG SURPRISE!
• Item #33, zoning signs have to be bigger. It’s about time.
• Item #40, exemptions to inspection fees. While I agree totally with the list of entities, I’m curious about one of them;
Section 41.007. EXEMPTION FROM PERMIT AND INSPECTION FEES.
Habitat For Humanity of Greater Sioux Falls, Incorporated; Make-A-Wish Foundation; Repair Affair Projects of the Home Builders Association of Sioux Falls; and the Home Modification Wheelchair Ramp Program of Independent Living Choices; South Eastern Development Foundation; and Community Development Department Neighborhood Revitalization Program projects are exempt from payment of fees for plat and/or plan reviews, permits and inspections from the following major organization units:
(a) Planning and building services; (b) Public works; (c) Fire prevention division; and (d) Police.
Am I missing something? Why would the Make-A-wish foundation need this exemption? Just curious.
• Item #41. Approving ‘complete streets’ in a resolution. While I support this proposal, I am curious why this did not go through an ordinance process instead of just a ramrod resolution process? Let’s pray about it.
• Item #43-44, oddball annexations.
• Item #44, Notice the overbid on the re-roofing of the Pavilion took over $400K from other projects planned at the Pavilion (this does not come out of the Pavilion operating subsidy, this comes out of our CIP).
• Item #45, the beat down of Councilor Dr. Kermit Staggers. Each year when Kermit wants to go to a conservative municipal government conference, he gets scrutiny. Yet none of the other councilor trips get this kind of scrutiny. As I told Kermit today, while I don’t agree with every aspect of this conference, it is always good to get different perspectives on municipal governing. I have often said, maybe he will learn ‘what not to do’ at this conference?
The Mayor’s ‘Shut Up & Listen’ session, June 29, 2015
(FF: 26:50) A resident of Prince of Peace asks a question about better education funding in rural Minnehaha county. The mayor says it is out of his control, which is NOT true. The more TIF’s the city approves, the more it affects education funding. Also, the recent vote with school boundaries at West Central was very much a city issue. Some very close Huether supporters were VERY involved with the campaign to uphold the school board’s decision to allow SF to suckup West Central school boundaries. Mike might want to say he isn’t involved, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth. The interesting part of the West Central campaign is that they didn’t need to financially report their donors. I would be curious to see how much Hizzoner donated to the campaign?
(FF: 43:40) A resident says she is dismayed about eliminating the free pool passes. The mayor blames no fee increases, and then blames the poor (52% swim for free). He also is troubled about the program ‘growing to large’. Then he starts to talk about the indoor aquatic center, and how ‘we’ need to pay for it. Then he brings up being the beer can collecting poor kid from Yankton. He calls the 52% free passes as an ‘imbalance’. DAMN RIGHT IT IS! People are broke in this town, we don’t have a jobs issue, we have a WAGE issue.
He ends the discussion by saying ‘Nothing is for FREE’. Hypocrite. You mean like the $500K of public dollars that went to a tennis club that bares your name for 102 members? You did not pass up that ‘freebie’. He talks about ‘working for it’. What amount of ‘work’ did you do to swindle the taxpayers of Sioux Falls out of $500K for your ultra-wealthy membership of the Huether Matche Pointe? It’s good to be King.
UPDATE: One resident gets up and chews his ass about the importance of FREE swimming for the poor children and learning how to swim.