Gov. Paper Doll (G/C-Tim Benson)
l3wis 
l3wis
Sioux Falls City Council Agenda, May 3-5, 2021
State of the City Address • Mon, May 3 • 1 PM (State Theatre)
This address can be viewed via livestream at www.facebook.com/citysiouxfalls
Informational Meeting • Tue, May 4 • 4 PM
Presentations;
• ADA Transition Plan by Sharla Svennes, Assistant City Attorney and Human Relations/ADA Coordinator; Peter Blanck, Ph.D., J.D.  and James G. Felakos, J.D., Blanck Group LLC (I have no idea what this is about, no supporting documents)
• Comprehensive Housing Plan by Jeff Eckhoff, Director of Planning and Development Services; and Matt Tobias, Development Services Manager (I have no idea what this is about either, no supporting documents)
Regular City Council Meeting • Tue, May 4 • 6 PM
Item #6, Consent Agenda;
Sub Item #29, South Dakota Research Park, Inc. dba USD Discovery District, Funding Agreement providing innovation focused economic development strategies, development of public-private partnerships and to foster innovation driven industry growth. Actively support economic development and workforce development initiatives. $150K (while this is a good initiative, it would be nice to have a presentation from them on what they are doing instead of just shoving this into a consent agenda item).
Items #24-25, So this is interesting, Sanford’s Golf Shots is transferring it’s liquor license to the Sanford Event Barn, and then in the next item, the Barn is transferring its license to Golf Shots. I’m so glad one of our major health systems in Sioux Falls have all this time to horse around with liquor licenses and their ownership 🙁
Item #26, Most people know that a bar is likely going in the corner space of the Washington Square building on the main floor (even though a roof top bar would have been much cooler). So where has their liquor license been parked while they are waiting to open? Two doors down at Parlour ice cream shop. Funny, that was one of my favorite places to get ice cream last summer, and I never saw a full bar in there 🙁 The lax rules on how licenses can be ‘parked’ is ludicrous and needs to be changed.
Item #53, Second Reading, AN ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF SIOUX FALLS, SD, REZONING PROPERTY LOCATED NORTH OF W. BENSON RD. AND WEST OF N. MARION RD. FROM THE PO-PUD PEDESTRIAN-ORIENTED PUD DISTRICT TO THE RA-1 APARTMENT RESIDENTIAL—LOW DENSITY AND RA-2 APARTMENT RESIDENTIAL—MODERATE DENSITY DISTRICTS, NO. 14007-2021, AND AMENDING THE OFFICIAL ZONING MAP OF THE CITY OF SIOUX FALLS. This is the rezoning for apartments next to the new Amazon Warehouse. As we know CountCilor Jensen has a financial conflict, and some think Selberg does also. We will see if they both recuse themselves and tell the public what that conflict is. This is a controversial item because the neighbors who have homes out there were lied to by developers, as usual, and of course the planning department plays along and says, ‘You can always ask us questions.’ Here’s one, ‘Is it hard to breathe with your heads stuck up developer’s asses?’
Item #55, 2nd Reading, AN ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF SIOUX FALLS, SD, AMENDING THE CODE OF ORDINANCES OF THE CITY BY AMENDING CHAPTER 77: PARKING REGULATIONS, SUBCHAPTER: PUBLIC PARKING ADVISORY BOARD. During the 1st reading several councilors suggested that they need to streamline the public boards qualifications.
Planning Commission Meeting • Wed, May 5 • 6 PM
Item 2E, Rezone for Foundation Park so they can chop up lots and spend our TIF money.
Item 2I, Rezone for Water Reclamation
Item 2J, Expansion of an existing VL Casino. Just what we need 🙁
Item 2K, More details on the expansion of the Sanford Sports Complex;
Item 5A, Rezoning from C1 to C2. This will be just north of the gas station on 18th & Cleveland. I am not sure if there is any neighborhood opposition. But what I find interesting is if you read all the documentation there is not one single mention of Dollar General in the documents. How did I figure it out? It was flagged that way in the document name ‘Dollar Gen.doc’.
This is something I have been railing on over the past couple of years where documentation in the agenda items in all the city’s public meetings is vague and hard to understand. I believe the attorney’s office in cahoots with the clerk’s and planning’s office is doing this on purpose. Why? It all goes back to the HATEFEST of Open and Transparent government.
I’m starting to think TenHaken is NOT interested in a 2nd Term
Many people within the city administration are starting to wonder if Paul is even interested in a 2nd term. Who files paperwork to run, asks for money then when questioned by several media sources if he is running for a 2nd term he blows them off. If he really was interested in a 2nd term, he would have at least put out a press release saying he WILL run for a 2nd term but will make an official announcement later this summer. I still think he hasn’t made up his mind.
He certainly hasn’t been having much fun fighting flooding, tornados and Covid, and from listening to him grunt and groan at the city council meetings, he certainly doesn’t like being there either. I think being mayor takes a person who likes social interaction. I think Mayors Huether and Munson truly enjoyed that part of the job, Paul seems to be uncomfortable with it. If he decides to not run, which is looking like more and more he isn’t, I wonder who they will recruit to run in his place. This could get pretty juicy.
What is interesting is that Paul moved the money he had left over from his first term into his PAC and I can’t find anywhere where that money was moved back.
In another bizarre move, he is having his state of the city address at the State Theater and it will only live stream on the city’s Facebook page. And good luck finding a seat once all the city employees fill it up.
Was the Police Chief asked to retire?
There seems to be a lot of speculation surrounding the exit of the Police Chief. If you look at his record over the past 6 years, little has been accomplished. Sex trafficking is on the rise, drug crimes and murder is on the rise, panhandling is out of control and body cams still have to be implemented. There is also still no physical fitness plan for the police like there is for the fire department. I wouldn’t call Matt Burns tenure a complete failure, but he certainly hasn’t achieved much more than putting himself into a higher pension bracket.
I have also heard through city hall moles that there have been several complaints filed against him for basically just warming a chair, not just from citizens but internally from other officers, and mayor stoneless is well aware.
I’m hoping they will do a national search for a new chief, but we know how the sh!t runs down hill in the Police and Fire Department. So it looks like a Chief Barthel 3.0 is in store for us.
Noem suing over fireworks is idiotic
Noem claims the Biden Administration is making this political? Really? Who is the one suing using taxdollars to spend more taxdollars on something most people don’t give 2-Sh!ts about. Noem has zero grounds to sue. The property is Federal not state, which she admits and she has no control over. As for a memo from Trump, that isn’t worth the paper it is written on. He is no longer the president, so it means nothing.
As for last year’s display, that was simply a taxpayer funded campaign rally for the Orange Menace and little else.
As for the fireworks, most people can’t attend anyway due to the lottery and most people don’t care. When I think of Independence day, I think of the great people in this country, it has little to do with a rock sculpture and Chinese explosives. Noem needs to concentrate on making the lives of working people in this state better and knock off her grandstanding.