In this interview with the administration’s newest advisor, she revealed something I have known about PTH for awhile;
“Our goal is to put something together that is realistic and achievable and well accepted by a diverse group of stakeholders and the public,” Harris said. “Sustainability should be a choice, and our job in government is to provide an education so people can make those choices. We aren’t doing mandates or forcing it on people because that isn’t how we want to govern. That isn’t how the mayor sees his role. He wants to be a uniting mayor.”
I would agree that a mandate doesn’t always solve an issue, in fact it can make it a lot worse, but when it comes to climate change we have exhausted most options. Letting industry decide if or how they are going to tackle climate change in their respective private industries means they will just choose to NOT do what government suggests. They already are on record for that. Sustainability isn’t a question of giving options you have to give and mandate direction, you also need followup and enforcement.
Just look at the over 4,000 property owners over the past 2 years that were MANDATED to repair city owned sidewalks because of the multiple ADA lawsuits filed against the city. So when the city is under fire from the FEDs to get their poop in a group they turnaround and mandate taxpayers fix the very sidewalks they are being sued over. City ordinance is pretty clear, the city has the authority to MANDATE just like they would when it comes to sustainability. I would even argue that global warming is a much bigger threat then cracks in a sidewalk.
If this mayor wants to UNITE the community, why not UNITE them around cleaner air and water? Recently the Argus Leader touched on that very problem;
Everything in the EPA’s dataset looks squeaky-clean for South Dakota, except for one category: water releases in Sioux Falls. In 2021, Sioux Falls disposed more than 5 million pounds of toxic waste into the Big Sioux River, about 2.5% of the nation’s overall generated water waste.
Nearly all TRI-registered water releases in the city involve one source: Smithfield Foods’ Sioux Falls facility, formerly known as the John Morrell Co. meatpacking plant.
In many ways, the Sioux Falls meatpacker is one of the worst water polluters in the U.S,
So while the mayor and his policy advisor want UNIFICATION I think mandating a communist Chinese owned packing plant would be a better approach since ‘suggestions’ are NOT clearly working. Now let’s all join hands and sing Kum by yah while the earth is burning.