The more I think about this proposal, the more I question this increase;
“Our system is more than 90 percent full. It will be 100 percent full most likely in the next two years before we can open a new parking ramp,” said Darrin Smith, Sioux Falls Community Development Director.
Projects like the new ramp cost money. That’s why the city is proposing a rate change in Downtown Sioux Falls.
WOW! Where do we begin?
• We tear down a parking ramp that was useful and sell it for $1.
• We are going to be 100% full in two years yet the parking ramp the city is paying for is for a private hotel and apartments, with only about 3-5% useable by the public.
• The city will be leasing the parking ramp to these private entities. Shouldn’t that lease payment cover the bond payments? If not, why not? What is the benefit to the public to build a private parking ramp that the public can’t use most of the time and make us take care of the short fall on the bond payments?
This whole thing stinks to high Heaven, and I hope the council removes their heads from their asses and votes this increase down and demands the parking department adjust the lease payments to cover the bonds, or better yet, make the PRIVATE development build their own damn parking ramp. Let free enterprise work for itself, otherwise it’s just parking socialism. Maybe we should call it ‘Obama-park’?