Are people skirting building permits in Sioux Falls?

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I found out today many people across the city are doing ‘projects’ on their homes without permits. Some of these properties have been reported to the city. Most of the projects are new roofs, but there have been reports of window replacements and even an entire house being gutted.

I guess one of the reasons this is going on is because the city has limited their building inspections. Not sure if that is true, but if it is, it seems odd. Building inspectors have less interaction with the public than police or fire does. If they are sitting on their butts at home, time to get back to work!

If our governor and mayor tell us we all need to go to work each day because hot dog makers, credit card hucksters and personal trainers are ‘essential’, it’s time they put their money where their mouth is and order all city and state workers to either be working full-time from home and if they cannot, report for duty. If anyone one is essential right now, it is people drawing a salary from taxpayers. If the rest of us can endure being exposed to Covid, the government workers should be able to also.

Maybe the Mayor needs to test his SOAR program out first on city employees?

The hypocrisy is unprecedented – and all reported from Noem’s $130K FOX News studio in the basement of the governor’s mansion.

When she was running for governor, my mother coined her as ‘Donita Trump’. How true it is. How true it is!

Maybe she should resign and hand the reigns over to Rep. Mike Saba, the only elected official in state government who is trying to fight through this crisis with calculated and studied approaches.

Give the residents of South Dakota the $1.6 billion

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Governor Noem says she doesn’t want to spend the Federal Covid money on Covid expenses, she instead wants it to offset the sales tax revenue. I think a better use of the money would be to send it to South Dakotans. If you gave it to every single resident of the state, we would each get around $1,800. If you just sent it to adults, it would be even higher. On top of that, if we turned around and bought stuff in the state with it, it would give the state (4 pennies) around $64 million in tax revenue.

What I am afraid is that Noem is going to end up pissing this money down her leg with massive handouts to corporations. She says it is for paying teachers. Hogwash. I think the best way to stimulate the economy in SD is to give us the money and we will decide how to spend it. But we know she would never do something like that, because that would mean she has compassion and common sense.

Many people have argued that we shouldn’t take this ‘handout’. Last I checked, we all pay Federal income taxes, it is ‘OUR’ money we are getting.

Mayor TenHaken to act proactively too late

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How do we beat Covid? With contests and prizes of course!

As you can see from this story on SFBIZ, the mayor has finally decided to help out businesses with how to create a safe work environment;

It will focus on enhanced measures large business can take to control the spread of COVID-19.

“That’s really where the big issues are,” Mayor Paul TenHaken said. “We will be working with our business community, specifically some of our larger employers, to get resources and tools, including on-site spot checks to make sure they are utilizing best practices in slowing the spread of COVID.”

Gee, I wonder who has been hammering about this for weeks? The lack of inaction has been deafening. It would be like installing fire sprinklers while your house is on fire.

Paul also decided to do an interview with the DTSF Rotary online today. He has some interesting things to say.

He decided it would be a good time to brag about his rental assistance program, a program that has zero transparency or accountability. In fact many renters getting this benefit are still being threatened with evictions. Why? Because since the city isn’t distributing the money, the non-profit that is, has no authority to enforce those rules. I warned from the beginning this was a bad route to go. Stehly has tried to make changes, but it may be too late.

PTH also brings up he may have to cut the city budget by 10-20%. Councilor Stehly commented on her FB page that this was the first time he has heard about this and wonder when he was going to fill them in on this. Last I checked the charter and council powers, they control the purse strings, not the mayor, but he still hasn’t figured that out in the past two years.

He also brings up this group of Type ‘A’ leaders he meets with on Thursdays. One councilor said to me, “Funny, that he has time to meet with these supposed business folks each week but no time to meet with councilors individually.” I also wonder if he is meeting with these people to become more like them, because while he has a few of the traits, certainly ‘workaholic’ and ‘highly organized’ doesn’t really fit his personality, unless you count him working hard at organizing his trucker hat collection in his garage.

He also said that Smithfields was probably not expecting a month ago to be closed now and being inspected by the CDC. That’s rich! It was inevitable that spread was going to happen there, they took virtually ZERO precautions! Not sure why Paul continues to defend them and their horrible planning. Oh, that’s right, MONEY! I have argued for years they need to close permanently. They have polluted our water and air repeatedly, and now helped to infect their workers who will infect a lot of us. It’s time the FEDS shut that place down for good, they won’t be missed.

John Michael’s Forum; Smithfields

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This probably one of the best Forums I have heard in a long time. While they touch on the things going on at Smithfields they also touch on how the corporate meat-packing plants and food processors across our nation are exploiting workers and farmers. Duh! They have been for years. I also saw a story last night about why the shelves are bare in our grocery stores, it basically comes down to distribution which is forcing many farmers to plow under vegetables, pour milk out on the ground and eggs being destroyed (I have even heard of poultry being destroyed to).

What is even more sad is how our Governor, Mayor and City Council have refused to take any action to protect workers, ALL workers. I’m not saying they should be shutting down business, but they could do a lot to make these places safer to work at. There is a balance government can play without infringing on people’s liberties. In this crisis government should be helping the businesses as much as possible to have a safe work environment.