Don’t quote me on this, it’s what Larry said on a hot microphone to state legislator, Steve Haugaard before Noem’s budget address just moments ago.
I have often warned elected officials across the state and locally to watch what you ramble in proximity of a microphone before a public meeting, it could be recording.
The conversation between Steve and Larry started out dry, literally, Steve asked if he needed to fill a glass of water for Kristi, which made me laugh, because it is further proof that all these guys do is carry water for her 🙂 Larry told Steve not to worry about it because Maggie will take care of it, and as we both know, she carries a lot of water for Kristi in attacking the fake news.
Then after a long uncomfortable period Steve asked Larry what he has been up to? Larry said, “I’m getting out of the ranching business . . . selling my cattle next spring.” Then he talked about his plan to sell the herd to a young rancher who has been “renting grass from him.”
While this probably isn’t earth shaking news, it may explain why Rhoden all of sudden became a full-time employee for Kristi.
Kristi and her ilk have been government welfare recipients for decades, and it seems to continue as governor when Rhoden needs to get out of the ranching business. And why not, it’s a lot more lucrative warming a chair in Pierre on the taxpayer’s dime.
UPDATE: It was also interesting to watch Stormland-TV pan the camera across the floor and focusing on those wearing and not wearing masks. My rough estimate is that about 33% of legislators were wearing masks, and it was a good mix of Republicans and Democrats (NO Democrats were unmasked). What surprised me was there was several Republican legislators from the Sioux Falls area not wearing masks.
• COVID-19 Update by Jill Franken, Director of Public Health (no supporting documents yet in SIRE).
• Engineering Design Standards Updates by Nick Borns, Aaron Fagerness, and Ryan Johnson, Principal Engineers (no supporting documents yet in SIRE).
Regular Meeting • 6 PM (This is the NEW meeting time because of the authoritarians on the council).
Item #7, Approval of Contracts
Sub Item #1, Leasing Police Vehicles. This one actually surprised me, I thought we bought vehicles and once they run their course we auction them. I am not opposed to it, but would be curious what vehicles these are. As I said with the administration building, it made little sense for taxpayers to spend millions in capital and maintenance when we could more economically rent office space, or better yet have many work from home.
Sub Item #8, Affordable Housing Solutions, Neighborhood Revitalization Program Site Acquisition/Development Agreement. $165K. While I am all for creating more affordable housing, our approach in Sioux Falls is comparable to killing a gnat with a bazooka. I still think my idea of giving small apartment building owners and smaller home rentals and small individual homeowners mini-TIFs to fix up property goes a lot farther and has NO initial costs except collecting less property taxes for a small amount of time. I have suggested the TIF’s should be only 1-3 years at most. Of course this is NOT how we do things in Sioux Falls, we give to big time freeloaders and hope the urine trickles down to us little guys.
Sub Item #11, Training Werks, Agreement to Provide Coaching, Assessments, and Consulting to Employees and Officers of the City. I’m trying to figure out when the city stopped hiring ‘qualified’ people. Wait, don’t answer that question. We seem to be spending a lot of money to coach these folks. I also don’t know if I have much confidence in a place that can’t spell works correctly 🙂
Item #11, Deferred from the meeting of Tuesday, December 1, 2020; A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE COLLECTIVE BARGAINING AGREEMENT BETWEEN THE CITY OF SIOUX FALLS AND AMERICAN FEDERATION OF STATE, COUNTY, AND MUNICIPAL EMPLOYEES. (I’m not quite sure what will happen, but I guess the council has not been happy about how the Mayor put the budget forward before this contract was finalized).
Item #12, AN EMERGENCY ORDINANCE OF THE CITY OF SIOUX FALLS, SD, TO REQUIRE FACE COVERING IN AN INDOOR PUBLIC PLACE WHERE 6-FOOT SOCIAL DISTANCING CANNOT BE ACHIEVED. (this is an extension of the mask mandate, but still has no penalties for non-compliance).
Item #14, A RESOLUTION DECLARING CERTAIN REAL PROPERTY OF THE CITY SURPLUS AND AUTHORIZING THE DEMOLITION THEREOF. (This is the Tuthill house demolition proposal. I suspect many people will be coming to testify against this. If I had to make a guess on how the council will vote, I think they will have at least 5 votes to save the house, or at least give it a year to figure it out. I am hoping that the council takes to task the Parks Director, Don Kearney, for letting this property go to Hell).
Item #15, A RESOLUTION APPOINTING MEMBERS OF THE DISTRICTING COMMISSION.
It’s actually a pretty good crew (besides the hospital executive, but I guess he was the only one to apply in that district) I am not sure who all applied, but I do know some ‘rats’ didn’t make the final cut;
Name • Party Affiliation •District Bob Thimjon • Democrat • Southwest Joseph Kippley • Republican • Southeast Mark Millage • Republican • Northwest Barbara Brooks Johnson • Democrat • Northeast Tom Hurlbert • Independent • Central
Item #16, A RESOLUTION ESTABLISHING REPORTING STRUCTURES, PAY SCALES, AND EVALUATIONS FOR CITY COUNCIL-APPOINTED STAFF. (It is interesting while they list the pay scales, they don’t tell us what ‘step’ each of the employees are currently at. What you will notice is that the pay range right now varies between $63-108K a year plus benefits. Interesting with such good wages you would think they would be able to figure out how to run meetings, properly record them and provide documentation to the public. Maybe instead of a ‘step’ raise it’s time to give them a kick in the rear.)
I finally watched this documentary today. Brought back a lot of memories and I was touched that it was dedicated to my late best friend Matt Staab who died almost 19 years ago (December 24, 2001).
I started going to shows in the summer of 1991 at Nordic Hall right before I moved to Sioux Falls. When I moved here in August of that summer I found a roommate in the paper and he happened to be a part time security officer who would work the shows there. I frequented the place quite a bit and my favorite bands to see there were 8 Barkfrom Chicago and God’s Favorite Band from Minneapolis.
I met Matt and Jesse Christen in the early 90’s at weirdo watering hole Your House of Coffee on East 10th street (It is Shalom now). Matt worked at Kinkos and made a lot of the ticket artwork and fliers and I would help him with it since I worked as a graphic designer at a small print shop. After he died I inherited the job and created a ton of posters and ticket artwork for shows at the Pomp Room.
While it is hard for me to remember all the shows I saw (mostly for free since I was ticket art guy, or as they called me at the Pomp Room, Punk Ass Freak) I do remember some great ones like Fugazi, Zeke, Gwar, Danzig, Son Volt, Jayhawks, Los Straitjackets (where I was asked to get off the bar I was surfing on) and the list goes on and on.
I got a bad muscle spasm once stage diving in my back where I could barely walk for a month, and knocked a front tooth out at a Supersuckers show.
The music scene in the 1990’s in Sioux Falls was on fire and explosive. You could literally see live bands 3-4 nights a week and at least 2-3 national acts a month.
I miss those times. While it seems there is more cultural opportunities in Sioux Falls these days, they also seem very Lily White.
The funny part about the documentary is I knew a lot of the people involved, and it was great seeing some of those knuckleheads in the film since a lot of them have moved away.
I highly suggest if you went to Nordic or Pomp shows to check it out, brought back a lot of memories (of what I can remember) of sweaty mayhem.
For the record I have not spoken to anyone that is for or against tearing down this house, and if the city council approves it being torn down, I guess I won’t lose too much sleep over it. I have never been to any events at the home. But my main concern is how did we get to this point? My short answer (guess) is that the Parks Director is completely and utterly incompetent, a consistent liar, and should have been fired a long, long, long time ago. I also think Mayor TenHaken has been robbing money from the parks budget to spend on other stuff. The Parks Director has had a habit over a very long period of time to neglect maintenance in certain parks so things he wants to see gone gets rundown and gives him a reason to tear it up. He is currently playing that game at Terrace Park.
As you listen to the testimony (FF: 9:00) at the last Parks Board meeting where they approved the demolition (Motion passed with board members Stavenger, Nachtigal, and Begeman voting YES, and Conlin and Weber voting NO) you will hear several stories from neighbors about the suspicious neglect of the structure even though it has been taking in revenue. Also notice that the Parks Board Chair put NO time limits on the testimony and even allowed CALL IN testimony. Bravo! When can we get this at the regular council meetings?
As for what it would cost to remodel the home, even if the bid was close to $250K being floated by the Parks Department, that is a spit in the bucket. Heck even the neighbors said they would raise money privately to remodel it if the city would grant a one year moratorium. In my opinion, they should not have to raise the money privately, the city should have kept up on the maintenance. Also, remember, we are losing millions each year on venues all across the city, like the EC, Sioux Falls Stadium, The Arena, and the Convention Center (Maintenance and Mortgage is well north of $25 million per year). The remodel costs pale in comparison.
The home is also historical, kind of. I am often on the fence about what should be considered ‘historical’ or not. I guess I wouldn’t be opposed to building a more functional event structure to replace it, but that is not in the Parks Department plans, so remodeling the home seems to make the most sense.
Let’s face it, it is just another example of the Parks Director scorched earth plan for certain parks and a weird obsession by the current mayor to start defunding our parks. He probably wants more people spending time in church instead of in our parks.
I am not sure how the city council will vote on it, but I have heard a couple of them are NOT happy about the lapse in maintenance.
WINTER WONDERLAND
Speaking of waste of money, I have been after the city for years about what this costs taxpayers each year. I have heard all kinds of various estimates from $50K to $100K a year (installation, tear down and electricity costs) but I don’t think the actual numbers have been released for well over a decade, I wouldn’t be surprised if the cost was closer to $500K a year, and to be honest with you, I don’t think the city could even produce the numbers.
Now I’m not some kind of Scrooge, I think we should keep the exhibit, it’s nice in a cheesy small city Crissmassy sort of way. But I have suggested for a long time we should have it sponsored by various businesses and non-profits and let volunteers decorate the park while the city foots the bill for electricity. I guess the way I look at it, if we call church volunteers to clean up after a natural disaster (and then get reimbursement from FEMA), why not use volunteers to put up holiday decorations? Heck, the city and parks department might even be able to make some money from it to go towards expanding it?
We suggest remodeling a historic home is a waste of taxpayer money but blow money on ‘decorations’ year after year when we could privately raise that money. This is just another example of how the parks department likes to change the narrative when they don’t want something.
Last night was kind of uneventful, except when Walter showed up.
During public input, Mr. John Cunningham threw some good barbs about the ethically challenged city and made the comment, ‘We have a mask mandate but you don’t have to wear a mask unless you want to, kind of like ethics rules that say you shouldn’t accept gifts from lobbyists, unless you want to. . . ‘ While John is right, it didn’t stop a gentleman (our new Trumpist in town, who kind of reminds me of Jeff Dunham’s character, Walter) claimed John didn’t have the facts. Really? Oh, I think John had the facts, it’s just that the authoritarians didn’t allow him to bring them to the hearing.
I have also noticed that the Mayor has become more and more intimidating about asking public commenters their name. As far as I am concerned, you don’t have to give your name, only that you are resident of Sioux Falls. While I think it is in public input ordinance that you have to give your name, I believe it is a violation of your 1st Amendment Right to anonymous dissent. I also think asking for a name is a method used to intimidate average citizens from commenting. Since public input will now be at the end of the meetings thanks to the authoritarians JENSEN, SELBERG, ERICKSON, NEIZERT AND TENHAKEN, I am still encouraging citizens to speak out. We may even have some surprises for them . . . stay tuned.
During the informational meeting they introduced their ON-DEMAND Transit Pilot Program. What surprised me about the presentation was I’m not sure what took so long to develop something that is coming directly from a private contractor? I am also of the opinion that we need to fix paratransit and the fixed route before horsing around with this. For a city our size, we have one of the worst public transit systems in the country.
We also heard about problems at some of our local bars (PAVE and LaCretta), mostly that they like to crank the music too late at night. A Lt. from the SFPD told a different story that there have been underage drinking problems. When asked by councilors why they haven’t heard of these problems, the Lt. said, “I pass that information on to the licensing department.†Obviously, Jamie Palmer, the licensing agent who mysteriously got promoted to the job after Debra Owen was fired, isn’t passing that information along to the council. Hmmmmmmm.
The big fireworks of the night that really are not going to go off until next week was six of the councilors (Jensen and Kiley were NO votes) deferred the union contract with the regular city employees (not PD or FD). The reason? They want the mayor to explain where the money is coming from for their new contract.
Sidenote: While this may not have anything to do with the city council I wanted to address all the hysteria around vaccines. For the record I have never received a flu shot and I can count two times where I had the flu so bad I stayed in bed for a couple of days. That being said, when available I WILL take the Corona Vaccine and YES I trust it. Many people have argued that since it was done so fast, how can it be reliable? While I agree that long term health effects, allergies and effectiveness can be better measured over a longer review process, I think this has little to do with the time frame and more to do with money. In our greedy society, especially the enormous greed of Big Pharma, if you put a lot of money behind something (like the Feds did with the vaccine research) they will hop right on it. I have actually believed for years that better treatments for Cancer and Aids even cures would come faster if Big Pharma could find a way to fill their pockets faster. While I thought Trump was the worst president in the history of our country (yup, he beat out Reagan) he did do two things correctly, killed the Iranian General and Operation Warp Speed. There is NO reason why in a modern society we cannot create treatments and cures fast, just throw a bunch of money behind it.
l3wis 
