Is the Sioux Falls City Council having policy discussions in Executive Session?

I would really like to know.

Why is this important? City Councilors have executive sessions with legal counsel almost weekly, by state law only certain legal matters are discussed, like pending litigation, current litigation or personnel issues (like potentially demolishing an immigrant’s unfinished mansion or disciplinary action towards a council employee).

Things they cannot discuss is potential policy changes (like creating new ordinances, advocating for consulting or outside assistance, or giving employees bonuses). Basically anything that is an ‘idea’ cannot be discussed because of the quorum.

Now councilors can have offline conversations with each other, and that is perfectly legit, but NOT as a group, those meetings and conversations must be public.

So why am I suspicious this is going on?

A few years back when that rascal Tex Golfing (Rex Rolfing) was on the council (you know the guy that beats the gavel puck like a rented mule) he was having policy discussions about having a car rental fee go towards some capital improvements. When opposition to his idea became aware of his backdoor policy discussions his plan crumbled.

This is an example of why you need to have public policy discussions, while his idea was horrible, what was even worse was he was trying to do it under the guise of pending litigation discussions.

Last week the council had a scheduled executive session, before the session they have to vote in public to go into that session. Forum News Reporter Patrick Lalley witnessed a councilor walk out before the session started telling Lalley that they left because they were not following procedure and they had no idea what the session was about.

But way before this incident several past and current councilors have told me about different policy discussions they have been having or had and I have been puzzled by how I have not heard of any of these proposals in a committee meeting or informational meeting (this is where policy is supposed to be discussed). I just assumed councilors were having offline convos with individuals but it seemed odd to me that after hearing about the proposals first hand all of a sudden they are on the agenda. These kind of discussions about in depth ordinances HAVE to be done with a quorum to be successful, playing phone tag won’t cut it, so obviously they are having these discussions somewhere, just not in the public eye.

Like I said, I would really like to know if the council is having policy discussions in executive session, because if they are, that’s a BIG NO NO and at least four of them should know better and the other four should have the common sense to distinguish between actual litigation and policy discussion.

The next time an executive session is called and policy is brought up I encourage the entire council to adjourn and walk out.

“Keep your fears to yourself, but share your courage with others.” Robert Louis Stevenson