2008 Water Audit

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The 2008 Water department audit is very telling on many levels. Ironically, it was the last full audit of the water department. I found the highlighted paragraph below and the expenditures interesting;

We paid for water upgrades using CIP money. Why? Because that is what that money is for INFRASTRUCTURE! Something else you don’t see in this paragraph is any mention of violating state or federal laws by doing this. Why? BECAUSE IT IS NOT ILLEGAL! This sudden shift to pay for upgrades using fee money IMO is an attempt to shift sales tax dollars to help pay down a new Events Center bond. I don’t know about you, but the timing couldn’t be more suspect. While the mayor has been preaching about NO NEW TAXES to pay for a new EC, he fails to mention the fee increases, not just in water and sewer but also in Parks and Rec, and other departments. While he talks about prudence, he is quickly becoming one of the biggest proponents of tax increases of any mayor we have seen in the recent past. I’m sorry mayor, but any fee paid to a governmental agency is something I call a TAX. Water rate increases IS a tax increase.

Posted in: Sioux Falls

10 Thoughts on “2008 Water Audit”

  1. Poly43 on June 17, 2011 at 7:53 am said:

    You’ve summed it all up pretty neatly l3wis. The Event Center cookie jar money is directly proportional to fee increases. It is this same kind of marketing skill that the feds banned from places like First Premier Bank Card. You know…the place ‘honest mike’ came from. It’s called Fee Harvesting.

  2. Pathloss on June 17, 2011 at 8:53 am said:

    Mikey’s been exposed. Munson tried to shake the coins out of us with camera tickets, citations, and general wipe-your-ass fees. He got shot down and so should Huether. It’s simply amazing that a city of 120K can’t make it on a budget of $330M annually.

  3. Jim on June 17, 2011 at 8:54 am said:

    Now the way I read it is that the pipes were replaced when a street was torn up and the CIP money was used there, but if there was no street work CIP money was not involved?

  4. l3wis on June 17, 2011 at 12:07 pm said:

    “general wipe-your-ass fees. ”

    I got charged that once at McKennan Park, but I am still suspicious, I don’t think that guy was a parks worker.

  5. l3wis on June 17, 2011 at 12:18 pm said:

    Jim – Looks like they were also re-lining the pipes to with CIP money. As for pipes for new development, I have often felt developers need to help pay for those.

  6. Scott on June 17, 2011 at 1:15 pm said:

    Come on, Scott, you fascist socialists! “Developers” shouldn’t have to spend ANY money! They’re doing God’s work, and we should just hand them EVERYTHING!

    BTW, what’s the current balance of that fund they were supposed to have a 50% partnership with the city?

  7. l3wis on June 17, 2011 at 1:37 pm said:

    As of April of 2011, since the penny was raised to a full 2 cents, taxpayers have contributed $13,683,503 and developers have given $324,323. Quite the match? Huh?

    http://www.siouxfalls.org/~/media/documents/finance/monthly_reports/2011/April_2011.ashx

  8. Scott on June 17, 2011 at 2:47 pm said:

    Although I’m an accountant by trade, I’m a bit confused as that doesn’t appear to be 50/50.

  9. Poly43 on June 17, 2011 at 3:35 pm said:

    As of April of 2011, since the penny was raised to a full 2 cents, taxpayers have contributed $13,683,503 and developers have given $324,323. Quite the match? Huh?

    Those numbers look suspiciously like the difference between fulltime and parttime wages for city water works employees.

    🙂

  10. l3wis on June 17, 2011 at 8:26 pm said:

    Yeah, taxpayers have only contributed 39x more then the developers. Seems fair.

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