The first thing he does in this interview is blame the last guy for the problems with the Bunker Ramp. While there is ‘some’ truth to that, he could have put the brakes on immediately after he took office, instead he took a piece of toilet paper signed by developers that said they were good for the money.
Then he says he doesn’t want to do an audit until after it is finished, while that is SOP, and I get it from a financial standpoint, there is NOTHING stopping him from looking into what went wrong RIGHT NOW. That doesn’t take an audit to achieve, it requires him doing his job as the city manager and city employees boss (his main job according to charter) and putting a boot up their butts or at least a stern talking to and get them on investigating what went wrong before we sign on the dotted line for another developer to finish it.
He once again fails to lead.
I really believe one of the reasons the deal fell through towards the end is because of the Sioux Steel development and potential for a TIF funded parking ramp.
This is pure speculation of course, but think about it for a moment, what if they would have allowed the Bunker Ramp Hotel to be ‘scaled back’ and finished? That means a nice hotel in the center of our downtown would have opened at least a year before the Sioux Steel Hotel and Convention Center. Things that make you go hmmmmmm. I won’t get into all the players involved, but something smells funny here.
Towards the end of the interview, PTH continues to blabber about charging non-profits for police assistance, China and Kermit.
But it was NixonHaken who held the press conference with Lamont and Beck talking about the future of the “Village on the River” project, and when he did that, he owned it.
You can blame LBJ for Vietnam, but when you begin to secretly bomb Cambodia, then a “Vietnam Conflict” becomes your South East Asia dilemma.
When the Bunker Ramp deal collapsed, the mayor should have pulled a JFK, who accepted the responsibility for the failure of the Bay of Pigs, a CIA project, which JFK inherited from Eisenhower’s CIA, but instead he pulled a Nixon and continued the war.
Although, to his defense, unlike Nixon, who secretly bombed, our mayor publicly bombed with a press conference which caused him to own this major debacle.
And as far as the Bunker Ramp and the Sioux Steel projects, I have had the same thoughts. Would have this town been big enough for both? Not in the near future in my estimation. The Bunker Ramp failure definitely invites the Sioux Steel project to a degree, but since developers seem to be in charge, do they really care about over building? Heck, there are still retail spots in this town, which were built before the Great Recession, which still haven’t been leased out….#WhatIsHotelOnPhillipsToDo?
TenHaken was focused on becoming mayor. It was an ego trip. Huether left a disaster nobody could recover from. I’m glad Jolene didn’t win. She’s potentially a good mayor once the Huether debacle is mended. TenHaken made a mistake adding sub levels he could blame. Wasting the careers of others is cruel. He should do one term and escape with some bruises. He’s no leader. The right leader would have gone after Huether for conspiracy and immediately thwarted the city into bankruptcy. It’s coming in the next term. When you can’t pay for eccentricities as successor, tell bond holders sorry about that. We have all these pavilions, coliseums, theaters, and bath houses we can blame on Huether without having to pay for them. It’ll take a year in court but this city will come out shining. Look at Trump. He never succeeded at anything but he lives like a king.