What’s going on with our TIFilicious, affordable(?) housing project in North Brandon?

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I was just thinking about this the other day . . . and for me and the good pastor, Sioux Falls City Councilor, Rich Merkouris, to have the same inquisitive thoughts, it was a little eerie.

During the informational Rich asked our housing specialist, Logan Penfield, what was going on with the North Brandon project and Logan responded by saying he wasn’t sure and had to get back to Rich.

Seems a bit odd doesn’t it?

Councilor Merkouris just stepped into the vice chair leadership position a few weeks ago. So now with a few weeks of insider baseball under his belt he seemed to pull this question from the sky . . .

. . . and after doing a long presentation on a housing action plan you would think Mr. Penfield would have the answer to that question on the tip of his tongue. But Mr. Penfield has experience in good old Washington, a place where it is best to ignore the hard questions.

I was thinking about the project because after all the fanfare you would have thought there would have been a ribbon cutting already with dirt moving? Instead a staffer from the administration (who is in charge of projects like this) hands over a big fat I don’t know with a shoulder shrug.

While the administration may think it is Sioux Falls ONE it is more like Sioux Falls IDK.

Maybe this is the reason Sioux Falls is limiting credit card parking meters

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So what do most people do if they are in a hurry? They say ‘F’ck it’ and move on. If someone is in a hurry and they find a parking spot DTSF but don’t have any change to feed the meter (that doesn’t have a CC reader) they will probably not go looking for another spot and just risk the ticket. Maybe that is what the city is hoping for.

You can either listen or read the interview;

GRABAR: I think so. Essentially, parking enforcement serves as a subset of what is now known as revenue-driven policing. And the idea here is that cities take advantage of these parking laws to try and get as much money out of people as possible, but not in the way that you would think, right? I mean, I think this is a common misconception. Meter rates are actually, for the most part, pretty low in most cities, which is to say they are below the market clearing price that would create empty spaces on every block. Most cities make more money from illegal parking fines than they do from meters and garage taxes put together. So, for example, New York City in 2015 made $565 million in parking fines. It’s the biggest category of fines that the city issues. But they made just $200 million from parking meters.

So what’s essentially being run here – and I don’t know if cities are conscious of this – is a system that is poorly designed that almost seems like the incentives are in favor of illegal parking because for the city, that’s where they make their money.

I would have loved to been a fly on the wall when the Parking Director, Matt Nelson and Mayor TenHaken had a conversation about getting creative with raising more parking fees. Probably went something like this;

Nelson says, “Paul, we just gotta find a way to get people to park in the ramps more.”

TenHaken responds, “Thank goodness I stopped that naked Indian mural, because that certainly would have drove drivers away.”

Levitt presents a solid season

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I finally had a chance to review the music of the bands playing this year. They have a great mix of country, bluegrass, hip-hop, pop, blues and alt-rock.

The bands not to miss this year are;

Radio Free Honduras (amazing music!) • Robert Jon & The Wreck (Blues Rock) • Patty PerShayla & the Mayhaps (alt rock) • Young Dubliners (Irish)

Don’t get confused by the band ‘Blood Brothers’ they are not the extreme punk band from 10 years ago, I think they are Canadian Blues (those two words don’t sit well together)

There are a couple of performers that are not my cup of tea but most of it is solid entertainment and it’s FREE! I am assuming at the June 2nd opener they will be handing out copies of the 2021 and 2022 annual reports. 🙂

New Mural at Levitt

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Sioux Falls artist Walter Portz is painting this mural on a wall of an old warehouse next to the Sioux Steel project. It faces the grounds of the Levitt Pavilion.

Looks like a girl about to eat an orange (just as long as it is NOT a shirtless Native we are good 🙁 I wouldn’t want the Mayor’s Art Police to deem it inappropriate.)

Sioux Falls City Council to be hopping tonight

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There has been some chatter over the past couple of days that people will be speaking tonight at the council meeting over some controversial items. First is Item #110;

The purpose of this application is to allow the development of an institutional use over two stories tall.

This is a rezone to build the new state offices in a consolidated area next to Dawley Farm on the east side;

Advocates, The state plans to consolidate its various services into a “One-Stop” location.  That’s a fine idea, but the location is highly problematic: the far east side of town, far from the city center, far from other services people need.
    Here’s a KELO article on this:https://www.keloland.com/keloland-com-original/lawmaker-concerned-with-sioux-falls-one-stop-location/    Sure, it’s move by the state, but our City Council cares about quality-of-life situations for the people of our city. At their meeting tomorrow(Tue) at 6pm, they can make the state take another look for the One-Stop location by not accepting the zoning change.    YOU can weigh in by (1) Coming to City Council meeting, 235 West Tenth St. and/or (2) Contacting city council members:

David.Barranco@siouxfalls.org, Sarah.Cole@siouxfalls.org, AlexJensen@siouxfalls.org, Rich.Merkouris@siouxfalls.org, 

gneitzert@siouxfalls.org, mselberg@siouxfalls.org, csoehl@siouxfalls.org, pstarr@siouxfalls.org, Mayor@siouxfalls.org

Obviously the new location also has issues with public transit.

The 2nd item has to do with alcohol licensing of a Lucky Lady’s Casino on the Loop that has been very troublesome. Item #19, Exhibit B on the consent agenda, MG Oil, Lucky Lady 1 & 2. I am of the understanding that between 4-6 councilors support pulling the licenses due to being a public nuisance. The council can reject a license based on suitable owner and suitable location.