There has been some rumblings for awhile that certain people at city hall are a little envious of the BID (business improvement district) tax. They want it so bad, they can taste it. In fact, the mayor’s wife tried to snatch some of it up to help market (raise money) for the indoor (private) tennis facility.
My drinking buddy (inside joke) Joe Sneve over at the Argus Leader can fill you in a little bit;
“Much has changed in the past five years in Sioux Falls and it’s prudent to step back and assess whether there are new or different opportunities of which we could take advantage and whether or not the priorities established five years ago remain the priorities today,” the email said.
The review committee will be comprised of councilors, CVB-BID board members and representatives from the public and business community. The group have three goals: find better ways to use available tax revenues, find any “quick-wins” that could be applied in the coming year, and make recommendations for long-term changes to diversify how BID revenues are spent, potentially using them for brick-and-mortar projects or expenses.
The original intent of this money was to market our city to bring in tourism, which is economic impact, which is funded by tourists. Seems to make sense. Use the extra ‘tax’ to fund marketing to bring in more travelers and tourists who use our hotels.
But it seems our mayor sees another cookie jar he can rob from for his ‘quick wins’. Not sure who will be on the BID review board, but I hope they recommend to keep things just the way they are, use 100% of the tax to market our city.
As for the mayor for proposing this review (to ultimately take some of this money) he really should be ashamed, but that would require him to actually have any shame to begin with . . . maybe with the help of God he can create some.