UPDATE: Brekke – Government Secrecy Press Conference

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UPDATE: I guess my initial takeaway is that this shouldn’t surprise anyone. I think people are getting so used to the games with transparency it just seems par for the course.

I think the biggest thing here is the confidentiality EO. As Janet pointed out words like ‘sensitive’ don’t really mean anything, and can be interpreted however. For example, if a maintenance employee told the Argus that the city spent $2 million dollars last year on toilet paper, and the mayor found out who told them, they technically could tell this employee that it was ‘sensitive’ information and terminate them. Basically a scare tactic to keep city employees from saying anything. While these kind of ‘rules’ exist in the corporate world, they have NO place in city government. Records should be open (besides litigation and personnel). City employees should not have to fear losing their job over it.

There is also a question of violating Federal whistle blower laws. Since the city receives Federal funds, those laws apply to city employees. City employees should have the right, Federally to report any misuse of Federal money or fraud. Federal Law almost always trumps state and local laws and ordinances.

As for the city clerk, I will say what I said when they hired Mr. Greco. They should not have hired him. The clerks office has two certified city clerks, one of them applied for the job after Lorie quit, she should have gotten it, instead, the HR department, controlled by the mayor not city council, picked someone with no certification, Greco wasn’t even registered to vote. We could go back and forth all we want about the lack of certification, the truth is, it should have never been an issue. Some would say that we would have lost one of the assistant clerks. Oh well, I think one main clerk and an assistant is enough. I would even go further and say we also should terminate the budget analyst since nobody knows what he really does, besides openly mocking councilors during public meetings like he did last Tuesday. Any duties he has could be easily handled by the Operations Manager. After they fired Debra it seems the office has gone to Hell in a handbasket, we had to hire 3 people to replace her, and they have less duties, and they take orders from the mayor.

It is also important to note that the city clerk is the responsibility of the city council, not the administration. He could have been sent to certification school on day one if they wanted to send him. I will be curious to hear what his excuse is, I’m sure it is some obscure rule pulled from the rear of Bill TheToole, the HR Director.

Another day of secrecy, what’s new?

You can the replay here;

Transcript and Index of Press Conference; Brekke-PC-transcript, Brekke-PC-Index

Below is a copy of the Executive Order by Mayor Huether on employee confidentiality. Signed in February of 2016;

These documents show the stripping the city clerk of the duties of official city record keeping; Clerk-Record-Keeping

These documents show samples of executive orders by the mayor; Example-Exec-Orders

These documents show an index of where executive orders are now stored; Exec-Order-Index

Sioux Falls City Council Candidate Brekke to have press conference on Monday about government secrecy

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“I have never seen anything like this in City Government” former Sioux Falls City Attorney Janet Brekke said Friday. “I am very concerned about the culture of secrecy which currently prevails in City government.”

While on the campaign trail Brekke has heard numerous complaints by citizens regarding the inability to get public information out of City Hall, as well as allegations of doctoring or tampering with documents.

“As a former City Attorney, I am aware of procedures that were put in place when this government was implemented that were designed to hold government officials accountable for their actions and to leave a paper tail of official actions” said Janet Brekke. “I have researched these procedures and will share my findings publicly on Monday, April 2, 2018 at the Downtown Public Library at 10:00 a.m.

In preparation for running for City Council Janet Brekke interviewed each of the current City Council members and City Directors. To prepare, she returned to consistently attending City Council meetings October, 2017. Brekke was City Attorney under five Sioux Falls mayors, beginning with Rick Knobe.

Brekke adds “In addition I have observed City Council members complaining of having incomplete information before being required to make major decisions. This must be corrected.”

Brekke will answer questions presented by the attendees and will be available following the press conference for interviews.

 

Lalley Show; Guest Brooke Blaalid talks about public input and local government

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Brooke Blaalid, Co-Director of Ready to Run who Prepares SD Women to Run for Political Office was the guest on Patrick Lalley’s show today. (FF: 35:00)

She talks about her resume and background, and one of the fascinating stories she brings up is serving on the Yankton City Commission. She makes some great statements about local government;

“Sitting at the city level is the most important part of government, I believe, we see change happening first and quickly, at the city level. There’s not a lot of citizen participation, unfortunately.”

Then she talks about the value of public input.

“Sitting on the City Commission, I thought there would be more social interaction from the community. I think I got maybe one or two emails while serving . . . that’s where all the great ideas come from, public input . . . I think when you have policy developed by people who are not at your educational level or social economic status, they have no idea how to create that, I think that’s where public opinion is so important, because you get good policy than.”

She also touches on being an Independent and how that makes you more approachable as a (female) candidate instead of being an extremist from the Republican or Democratic party.

Rex Rolfing continues to be a stalwart supporter of closed government

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Rex fears the minions will get the keys to the castle, so he has to try to kill the messenger of truth;

I am deeply troubled by Councilor Theresa Stehly’s recent letterto the editor titled, “Secrecy in golf management selection a concern.” Unfortunately, this letter is a classic example of a politician stirring the pot in order gain nonstop publicity in our local media.

Publicity? Stehly has two and half years left on her council term and she is NOT running for mayor, what publicity is she seeking? The only thing Stehly continues to publicize is her support for open government, 100% of the time. It was her campaign issue that won her her seat.

The RFP process reduces the risk to those who compete in the process by protecting the proprietary information of those who are unsuccessful.

When doing business with the public and receiving public money for your services your proprietary information is NO longer private, it becomes public. If those who seek public contracts don’t understand that or agree to those terms, they have the choice NOT to participate in the process. It really is that simple.

Publicizing unsuccessful proposals would severely limit those willing to participate if any thus reducing competition and driving up costs to the taxpayers.

I actually believe it would have an opposite affect. If competition can see who is competing and their proposals it will only drive them to put together a better and more fiscally prudent proposal. It would actually not only save taxpayers money but we would get better services. We found this out with the Pavilion window replacement contract. Once the initial bid was discovered to be inadequate competitors were able to under bid it and save taxpayers thousands of dollars. Closed bids and committees only give us one option, a piss poor way to do business.

As a person who works as an estimator I and am consistently wanting to know what my competition is charging so I can be more competitive. In private business sometimes that information is hard to get, but don’t think we don’t seek it out. I have done government bids throughout the country for states, municipalities and the Federal government and we are always told what the competing bids and offers are at the end of the day. Rolfing’s analogy of local government RFP’s is certainly NOT the norm because it defies that whole nature of free enterprise, competition and a the democratic process. He is delusional, as usual.

I would like to conclude my letter by recognizing those who have served on these committees especially our citizen volunteers. Thank you for your willingness to serve even while some attempt to politicize your efforts. I also ask our citizens to please learn all the facts and hear from both sides of any issue.

So why are certain ‘citizens’ privy to this information, but not all of us? Elected officials who strive for open and transparent government are NOT politicizing anything, they are promoting good government, and I applaud them for it. I also find it ironic that Rolfing is asking citizens to learn all the facts first before drawing conclusions. Isn’t kind of hard to receive those facts when you won’t share them with us? Your assurance is not enough, we found that out with the siding settlement which was a gigantic lie.

Often times those who yell the loudest fear you hearing all the facts.

To that I say, “Well-behaved women seldom make history.” - Laurel Thatcher Ulrich.

Huether agrees to transparency with data as he has one foot out the door

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“I’m all for opening the books of the city, and I will make sure that happens, in May of 2018. Think of it as my parting gift.”

Well he has told us he is the ‘most transparent’ mayor ever, he just never mentioned it would happen as he was leaving;

As part of the What Works Cities initiative, Sioux Falls will improve open data practices to make public information more accessible and to engage residents around government priorities and services. The project will include creating an inventory of the City’s data resources; developing a plan for data governance; making data available to the public and City staff in a more useful and responsive way; and helping City staff to maximize the use of data in their daily work. The first area of municipal government to undergo the work will be neighborhood services, including code enforcement, with the goal of making the process replicable for other departments and divisions.

“Over the past seven years, we have worked hard to make Sioux Falls City government more productive and efficient, and this partnership will take us to even greater heights. We are proud to be selected as part of this initiative,” says Mayor Huether.

For the past 7 years the only thing Huether has been dedicated to is keeping government as closed as possible, so this 180 turn by him is laughable, especially since he only has 10 months left in his tenure.

Trust me, I support this 100% and think it is a fantastic program, we should have implemented it 20 years ago, but better late than never.