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SF City Council

Alex Jensen SF City Council Sioux Falls

What do you think of Politicians who say they are ‘Positive’

l3wis 3Comments

My first interpretation is usually they are trying to paint their opponent(s) as being negative. Jensen has the following ad up on the internet;

I often tell people I try to steer away from labeling individual candidates as positive or negative. There are going to be tough decisions that are made, sometimes those decisions and that process can become pretty negative, but it has to be done. I judge a politician on whether they are truthful and transparent. I believe open government and decisions made in the public are very ‘positive’ even if it doesn’t appear that way, and having closed door meetings and coming out later and saying everything his peachy keen is kind of negative because they are probably hiding something from the public.

Has councilor Stehly ruffled feathers? (who BTW hasn’t announced yet) Sure, but she was instrumental in getting the administration moving on things, even if she hasn’t passed any legislation. Sometimes that very public pressure that may look messy, can have positive results.

As for the word ‘Proven’ I think that is even more overused then ‘Positive’. Jensen’s short stint in the legislature produced few results except voting down the party line. All that proves is that he is a rubber stamper, and we don’t need any more of those on the council.

I’ll say it again, I have nothing personal against Alex, but unless he starts to come out with some policy ideas for the city, he could spend a MILLION dollars and still not beat Stehly.

Bunker Ramp Downtown Sioux Falls SF City Council Sioux Falls

City asking for another $1.5 million to fill holes in the parking ramp

l3wis 6Comments

As I heard earlier in the week, the rumors were true (Item #79);

Public Parking
Amend Capital Improvements Program Project No. 19002, New Parking Facility, by increasing the amount of funding for construction by $1,500,000 in 2019. The additional funding will not require an increase in appropriations as it will be funded by public parking user fees.

As you can see from the resolution, few details of what the money is for. I asked some city officials today about it and they said the administration is giving few details, and that the city attorney says they will probably get very few on Tuesday night. I guess they think this will be a way to quell the litigation by blocking the holes.

Why do I have an image of a Dutch boy and a leaking Levee in my mind?

The biggest question is why we didn’t have enough in our contingency fund to complete the ramp? Isn’t that why we have CMAR’s is to handle these things? You know, like when we got the million dollar event center settlement from money that was ours to begin with.

This of course will pass, but I at least hope a little shaming ensues by those opposed before hand.

5G SF City Council Sioux Falls

The Telecoms are Full of Crap!

l3wis 8Comments

I won’t get into whether or not 5G causes Cancer or if the Chinese are spying on us, my butt hurt over 5G has always been the lack of public input and involvement;

“Thanks to the outspoken, progressive leaders, the network will launch by the end of the year, making Sioux Falls one of the first cities in the nation with 5G technology,” a news release said.

The Sioux Falls City Council was titty-twisted into approving this, coming down from on high from Ironic Johnny Thune-Bag and his water boy Mayor TenHaken because of millions in lobbyist money.

The public was NEVER consulted on whether they wanted this, or needed it.

I almost threw up a little when they used the words ‘outspoken’ and ‘progressive’. There is nothing brave or liberal about implementing 5G without public input. In fact the whole basis of bold leadership is listening to the needs of the citizens. The way 5G was implemented in Sioux Falls was a farce, and it has nothing to do with progressive movements but more like capitalist tricks and capitalist welfare.

SF City Council SFFD SFPD Sioux Falls

City of Sioux Falls trying to package new public safety facility bonds with past bad decisions

l3wis 7Comments

So this is what the city of Sioux Falls does, they make bad decisions in the past and instead of trying to correct them, they just pile it on with more bad spending decisions.*

While the new public safety center is needed, no doubt, they are playing a game with bonds and re-financing prior bad decisions;

Also included in the potential bonding package would be about $3 million for a new fire station in southeastern Sioux Falls and between $7 and $10 million for the third phase of the River Greenway project downtown. 

The two bonds being considered for refinancing were taken out by the city in 2009 for quality of life improvements, along with the flood levy project completed in 2015. Those bonds have $11.85 million and $19.7 million remaining on them, respectively.

That’s right, besides the public safety needs we want to continue to fund the river Greenway Project expansion (that is NOT needed – and likely will continue to flood due to global warming) and let’s not forget the fancy footwork the previous mayor played with Federal Funds that would have paid off the levy bonds but instead used the money to pay for the MAC that we didn’t need and continues to lose money each year.

If I was on the council, I would have NO issue with the re-finance and funding the public safety facilities, BUT, I would nix the expansion of the river greenway and just do inexpensive bike trail upgrades, etc, and stop building Roman like structures. We need to work on flood control of the Big Sioux, not build more monuments to nothing.

*There is a rumor I heard from another local media person that the city may need more money for another failed over budget project in town. I have no idea what that would be, or the cost – but I have my guesses. I guess the cat may be let out of the bag as soon as this week. Oh, brother.

Mayor TenHaken SF City Council Sioux Falls

UPDATE: Mayor TenHaken has been pushing for a 6 PM Council Meeting start time

l3wis 4Comments

As I have been hearing behind the scenes, Mayor Paul has been asking the city councilors their thoughts are on changing the regular city council meeting to 6 PM instead of 7 PM.

I got word yesterday that he has been fielding opinions from the council. If it goes to a vote, he will probably have the 4-5 votes he needs.

As you know, I’m against this change (I actually wish it would have stayed on Monday nights and the School Board and Minnehaha County Commission would change their meetings to 7 PM night meetings).

I think it is a good time for the working public to show up. It would be very difficult for people to make a 6 PM meeting if they have to work until 5 or 5:30. And BTW, these meetings are about the PUBLIC, not the elected officials or public employees, this is OUR meeting and it should accommodate us and our busy schedules, it is about open and transparent government.

Today at the city council informational, councilor Stehly made it public that the council was considering this move. She pointed out that if there would have been a regular 6 PM meeting tonight, the city council informational would have been cut short.

So why is the mayor pushing for this? Honestly, I think he wants to shorten the informational meetings for fewer questions, and he wants to limit public input, and lastly wants to get home earlier. Hey, Paul, if you don’t like being at the meetings, we can certainly change the charter so you don’t have to chair them anymore, but remember, you didn’t want that.

He has told the council that it is about the city employees coming to the Tuesday night meetings. As I have said in the past, the directors know what they signed up for, they are paid very well, and guess what, it is a PUBLIC sector job. Something else people may or may not know is that they get ‘comp’ time. In other words, if they have to spend a couple hours at the council meeting Tuesday Night, they can leave early on a different day, so it really isn’t cutting into their ‘private time’. I have also suggested if they don’t like working in the public sector, they can always work in the private sector with the rest of us, in a right to work state, where refusing to work overtime could result in termination, and there isn’t a damn thing you can do about it. City employees don’t have it that tough, and I think PTH is just using them as an excuse for his own personal agenda.

UPDATE: PTH also said that the media requested the meetings start earlier, this is NOT true, some in the media have denied this. Also, PTH claims it is for people who ride the bus. Not sure about this one either.

I hope the council doesn’t move forward with this, but I have a feeling they will, and one more notch will be put on the closed government bedpost.

UPDATE II: I guess the council has changed their mind on this, and it probably doesn’t have the 4-5 votes to change. I guess the Deputy COS also said the administration is calling it off.

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