I was pretty surprised when I watched this video and saw Michaels endorsing and introducing Julian (who is a Democrat).
If I was Julian, I would remind voters every single day that as a former law enforcement officer, he would never vote to go into a private/public partnership with a bunch of criminals like Greg did with the bunker ramp. I would make Greg own it every single frickin’ day.
After the ice storm there was a discussion about passing an ordinance that prohibits anyone from planting new or replacement trees in the boulevard. Besides the obvious mess it creates if we have windy storms, boulevard trees often cause damage to taller vehicles like trucks and snowplow maintainers. The roots also wreak havoc on utilities.
Before the ash borer the city would remove a tree in the boulevard at no cost to the homeowner. The top two reasons were it was either dead or messing with utilities.
It’s at least time to discuss the matter and do some serious research on the possibility. There are also many arguments for them. I think you could have it both ways, by maybe limiting density, etc. You could also have homeowners plant trees on the private property side of the city sidewalk.
Since Tuesday’s disaster I have been waiting for a government official representing Sioux Falls and South Dakota to say the FEMA word. No one has until yesterday when Rounds finally talked about FEMA assistance. But he clarified that would be up to Noem to ask for that assistance. So Donita Trump Noem. Are you? How about you Paul? As I said to someone today, watching the city’s ‘political’ response this week is like watching 1st Graders run city government for a class experiment.
So we hire private contractors to clean up residential areas while city employees are cleaning up the bike trail?! There was 4 of them. While I do know that cleaning up the bike trail is important and has to be done eventually, shouldn’t the priority be the residential neighborhoods first?
And apparently NOW the city says they ‘could’ pick up your stuff if you cannot;
Funny, as I predicted, TenHaken had a change of heart after Stehly and Starr put a motion forward. Heck, Neitzert’s FB post from below even disappeared. I wonder why? But the bigger issue is the mixed messages out there, citizens are confused why the city is picking up stuff when they said they would not. Many people have told me that the private contractors have been picking up all waste in the boulevard and have been asking NO questions about where it came from. So are they NOT following orders? Who knows? I guess one resident said that Councilor Kiley told some people to stop putting their private property waste in the boulevard, they ignored him and guess what? They picked it up. So I’m telling people, just drag it out there, they will probably pick it up.
Somebody asked me if I volunteered? I did not. Nobody asked me for help, in fact one of my friends asked ME if I needed help, I told him NO.
You will see that Neitzert calls the motion a political stunt. Greg can say some pretty ridiculous things (probably why he took it down). When a natural disaster occurs you have to have a multiple tiered approach. They definately should include volunteers, and I commend people for that. But it also should include a government response with assistance in cleanup. All people are asking for is that the rubbish be removed from the boulevard, they will do the work to get it out there. Why is this so complicated?
I will say it again, we pay taxes and maintain a reserve fund for these kind of events. This is NOT a handout, we will be paying for it. Not sure why the mayor is acting like the city doesn’t have two nickels to rub together.
The only political stunt occurring is the mayor and some city councilors acting like they know how to lead, because they are failing miserably.
Koch talking about the environment is like Trump giving us advice on climate change. Oh, and why are we using Tornados to grind trees, I think they did enough damage. Or do they mean they are going as fast as tornados?
l3wis