South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

2019

SF City Council Sioux Falls

UPDATE: Sioux Falls City Council Agenda, Sept 10-11

l3wis 4Comments

City Council Informational • 4 PM • Tuesday 10th

Presentations on the CVB BID Budget and Regular Budget Amendments. I’m not sure how many amendments there will be, but I do know about a couple of them.

Regular City Council Meeting • 7 PM • Tuesday 10th

Item #12, Deferred Resolution, Street Vacation. This will probably pass because the RS5 seem to be leaning that way. I think the only two that will vote against it is Starr and Stehly. What is weird is that the vacation isn’t really needed, and the State who are involved with it, doesn’t seem to care either way.

Item #16, 1st Reading, Supplemental Appropriations for the parks department for bike trail upgrades. No real explanation for this.

Item #17, 1st Reading, Property tax increase. The council hasn’t failed to pass this every year for well over a decade. I don’t think this year will be any different. Ironically, the city really doesn’t have to pass this, they can just leave the rate where it is. The excuses for raising the tax rate should be interesting . . . and TOTAL BS!

Items #18-21, Resolutions on the 2020 budget(s)

Charter Revision Commission • 3:30 PM • Wednesday 11th

The Commission trudges thru more articles of the charter.

UPDATE: The Presser on Tuesday at 10 AM is for the Events Center Campus Book Club recommendations.

Sioux Falls Washington Pavilion

UPDATE: Naturalization Ceremony at Pavilion

l3wis 2Comments

I was pretty excited to hear there was so many new US citizens being sworn in this time around they had to have a bigger venue, so they chose the Great Hall at the Pavilion which is an excellent venue for it.

But I heard an interesting rumor, the Pavilion charged rent for the ceremony. I’m assuming if that is true, the Feds paid the tab. While I understand they have to have staff work these events, if they are during the day, isn’t the staff there already anyway?

What I also found interesting is that the Pavilion gets ‘some’ Federal money, so they turn around and charge rent?! The Pavilion is also subsidized by local taxpayers and is a city owned building that receives millions each year in operational and maintenance funds.

So if the rumor is true, my question is, is the Pavilion so hard up for money they have to charge for such an event? Oh that’s right, this is the same entity that also charges admission into the VAC, even though they could get sponsors to cover those expenses.

UPDATE: There were several volunteers working the event, but I still have not heard if the Feds had to rent the place. Since the Pavilion has taken over the Orpheum, the city has to pay rent if they want to use it.

Alex Jensen SF City Council Sioux Falls Theresa Stehly

If I was Stehly, I wouldn’t spend one single penny

l3wis 34Comments

As I told Alex last night when I ran into him, I’m not sure if Theresa is running for a second term. But I what I did not tell him is, she is unbeatable, no matter how much money you spend. The only thing that could make Stehly vulnerable is if several people jump into that race (I do think there will be others). But in a head to head challenge between Alex, or anybody else, she can’t be beat. I am so confident of that, I would advice Stehly to raise NO money and spend NO money if she decided to run for re-election. It would be an amazing sticking point to prove money in local politics corrupts the system.

While I don’t agree with Theresa on many things (trust me, we have a lot of disagreements, and I also argue with her about her ‘style’ and ‘form’ sometimes) but the one thing that makes her extremely re-electable is that she listens to the people, and is their voice when NO one else on the council will speak for them, and for this, she will be impossible to beat if she runs.

SF School District Sioux Falls

Will taxpayers be asked to bail out School Bus Inc.?

l3wis 14Comments

I’m just asking the question a lot of other people are asking, If School Bus Inc. has to file bankruptcy or close down for any reason, will the Sioux Falls School District (taxpayers) have to bail them out?

I’m not sure what laws are in place to make that possible, but I’m not sure if the SFSD has a backup plan if the contractor shuts down suddenly. I also wonder why the district contracts with the company instead of just owning their own buses? I’m not sure what the rules are with that either. I think a lot school districts across the state contract the services, especially the larger districts, probably helps with a lot of headaches.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out, in the mean time I would make sure your kids have good sneakers and snow boots.

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