Haven’t We Learned Yet? (Construction Manager at Risk is a secretive process)

Construction Manager at Risk as practiced in Sioux Falls SD is a failure and no one in city government is willing to admit it. This video has Cameraman Bruce speaking during the Public Input portion of the Sioux Falls City Council Informational meeting on January 8, 2018. He followed presentations by city administrators extolling their versions of why it makes their jobs easier.  Nowhere in their presentations was proof offered we get a better building, other than a few “amenities”. But at what cost, what did we lose?

In 2016, a group of 6400 Sioux Falls citizens were part of the Stop the Funding effort to slow down the process of building the Romantix Annex City Center Administration building. It was an ill-conceived and poorly planned building designed to use up a portion of the city’s bonding authority before the last mayor left office. His rush was to have a borrow big money and then have a big going away party, not good government.

Now we are left with a building with many design flaws few want to admit. Why else would the original supporters of this building try to quietly spend over $400,000 to “fix” some of the flaws?

This is not a gotcha moment. The current administration did the right thing to not hide these problems. They did not create them. The other guy did it and he should always be the blame for his mistakes. His mistakes ended in May 2018.

We ask, why can’t these change orders, fixing mistakes be put in the public arena so we can be part of the solution and not always have to think the worst?