Local Sioux Falls promoters bringing in great music!
l3wis Bravo to our local promoters for continuing to bring great music to town. The Living Deads at Bonus Round Bar on Thursday night, Wreckless Eric at Total Drag Friday Night.
2018
Sioux Falls City Council Agenda, July 10, 2018
City Council Informational Meeting – 4 PM
Presentation on rate increases for ambulance service
City Council Regular Meeting – 7 PM
Item #7, 1st Reading, rate increase for ambulance. I encourage people to come speak to this item. You can now speak at 1st readings during city council meetings (I think it will be in affect). We need to push the city council to pursue a public ambulance service.
Item#11, Resolution, Implement a City Flag. I think this will pass the council 8-0, but I do expect some testimony from the flag supporters. Initially I wanted to see the process of selecting the flag to start over. But I have been reassured the process used was a good one. Besides, as pointed out during the informational presentation, if we did the process again, who is to say it won’t have the same results? I think our city council has a lot of important business to take on these days, and we should just approve the flag and move on already.
City of Sioux Falls Water Treatment Plant Expansion; Lots of Questions
Before we go off the deep end and spend $260 million for an expansion of the water treatment plant, some major unknowns need to be answered;
The city says we are at 82% Capacity. How long did it take us to get there? How many more years before we are at capacity? How long will it take to build the expansion? Can we draw this expansion out over 5-10 years, doing incremental changes?
What percentage of treatment is used for nearby towns that contract Sioux Falls to treat their water? Can we increase their rates significantly?
What is our true population growth? And how does that breakdown? How many newborns? Retirees, immigrants, new people/families? How many from neighboring towns that already use our treatment plant?
Why are we using the enterprise funds for capital improvements? Shouldn’t this be for operations and maintenance? Why not use 2nd penny funds to pay down bonds of new plant?
As you can see, we have a lot of big questions that need answers before we decide to move forward with the new plant.
ACLU of SD opposes Minnehaha County OPT-OUT
In response to the county commission’s consideration of an opt-out of property tax limits, Heather Smith, the executive director of the ACLU of South Dakota, sent the attached letter to the Minnehaha County Commissioners this afternoon. She’s also planning to attend the meeting on July 10.
DOC: ACLU SD ltr to Minnehaha County Commission PDF
Please take a look at the attached letter, but in brief, the ACLU of South Dakota is asking Minnehaha County Commissioners to shift away from funding incarceration and raising property taxes to find new approaches to our current criminal justice system. Our “tough-on-crime†policies have led to more arrests and increased costs, but don’t actually do anything to address the underlying causes of crime. Though the Commission may not have direct control over things such as who is charged with a crime and how many people are incarcerated in the county’s jail, it certainly has influence. There are myriad reforms that could be made on the local and state level that would keep our communities safe while also cutting costs.
In light of this proposed property tax opt-out and the school board’s proposal for its own opt-out, surely we could be looking at some alternatives so that the burden on Sioux Falls taxpayers/property owners isn’t so great.
Janna Farley, Communications Director, American Civil Liberties Union of South Dakota
DaCola Notes: In my conversation with commissioner Barth about the matter, I told him that the CC needs to have more control over the State’s Attorney’s Office when it comes to expenditures with certain prosecution cases.
Are the Railroads blowing smoke?
So I got this email forwarded to me by a city councilor yesterday, I’m not sure who sent them this (SF public works or BNSF) but I found it a bit humorous, to say the least;
We evaluated the potential changes to railroad operations as part of the Environmental Assessment (EA) for the project.  There is a BNSF Sioux Falls Operations Plan that is in the appendix of the EA.  It was anticipated that an extra 2 to 5 rail cars per month would need to utilize this area for parking and storage due to the track removal in the downtown yard.
If there is additional train traffic above this estimated amount, it is likely due to a higher customer demand, not because of the Rail Yard Redevelopment project.  For instance, Egger Steel is one of the businesses served by the track in this neighborhood and may be receiving or shipping additional steel due to market needs.
It’s no secret, Former Mayor Bucktooh & Bowlcut used to tell some pretty tall tales, but, after reading this, it is no surprise to me that the two (BNSF) negotiated the worst agreement in the history of our city.
First off, I don’t think I have ever thought the RR Redevelopment project has been causing the extra cars to be parked in the area, my point is that we should have negotiated that NO cars can be parked in the area. We gave BNSF millions to build a new switchyard out of downtown, why don’t they use it?
As for the 2 to 5 cars, LMFAO! If you go by the Nelson Park skate park or just North of Avera you will see between 40-60 cars parked in those area’s over the weekend and throughout the week. Are some of them steel cars? A few, I guess, but most are grain, lumber and biofuel cars.
I fully understand that we will still have to have rail traffic through downtown due to the suppliers, but I question why we need to park and switch these cars in this area? Seems the Railroads are blowing a lot of smoke.