SF City Council
l3wis Mayor Paul TenHaken’s office plays the bait and switch again tonight, or is it less complicated then that?
I’m actually surprised a good X-Tian like PTH doesn’t know what the NT has said about hypocrites;
Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says. – James 1:22
So this has happened three times now;
Stehly and Starr suggest we fund pothole fillin’ more, resolution gets voted down yet the mayor sends out an army to fill potholes (a couple an hour).
Stehly and Starr suggest Events Center Book Club meetings are open to the public, resolution gets voted down (or thrown out) can’t remember. Mayor opens up the meetings (yet no recordings have happened yet).
Tonight, happens again, Starr and Stehly suggest the housing summit’s registration is FREE and video recorded. It fails in a 4/3 vote with mayor breaking tie. But during the discussion, Tea, SD resident and Housing Director for SF, Chellac Unruh announces the fee will be waived (for the poor folk) and it will be video recorded.
So if Stehly and Starr’s resolutions are so bad and fail to pass, why is the mayor implementing the policy anyway?
Oh, right, that thing about being a hypocrite, I forgot.
Stehly responds to ED Board
I couldn’t have said it better myself, and for the record I never saw this response until I read it online a few minutes ago. I know some people think that I ‘feed’ Theresa stuff, but I have often contended she is her own person;
I will continue to make decisions and take actions to support, inform and protect the citizens I am pledged to represent. I refuse to go along to get along as the Editorial Board suggests. I will continue to promote constituent concerns while reaching out to help the taxpayers. They are the boss and taxpayer revenues are theirs. I will strive to make prudent, informed decisions, even if my colleagues don’t agree with me.
Yes Theresa, unfortunately it’s all about the Reindeer Games in Sioux Falls.
Mayor TenHaken proposes new budgeting process
At first glance I like the direction of this new process, especially the first tier;
It’s a two-page summary of the request that is then scored by committees of city staff from all 11 departments based on five criteria:
- Does it meet the goals of the city?
- Is it innovative?
- Is it sustainable?
- Does it foster partnerships with other organizations and agencies?
- Is it measurable?
After scoring about 50 of those “RFRs,” which Pritchett declined to share details about, the ones with the highest score are prioritized. That’s when the public engagement aspect of TenHaken’s budgeting process comes in.
This is really how department heads SHOULD be submitting their budgets through a scoring process. I also like the 5 questions, but where it gets wobbly is the 2nd tier where they say the ‘public’ would be involved;
“We want to engage people that may not have been engaged in the process in the past,” said Pritchett, who this month will bring the highest-scored proposals to a citizen group of Leadership Sioux Falls members to get even more feedback.
While having the public leadership group involved is also a great idea, I would apply it a little differently. As I have mentioned in the past, the City Council, the legislative body of the city should really be putting the budget together after the 1st tier is implemented and the leadership group weighs in. After that I think the COUNCIL not the MAYOR should introduce a preliminary budget that is presented to citizens in at least 2-3 public meetings/open houses where citizens can tell councilors what they like and don’t like. And during the process there should be an online participatory budgeting website that people can leave comments (an idea council candidate Weiland suggested). After that process is finished the council can present there final budget to the mayor and public.
Why shouldn’t the mayor be involved? First off, under charter, the council controls the purse strings, and secondly the mayor’s office is really just another department that can put in it’s requests like the other departments.
The city needs to get back to having our citizen representatives draw up a budget that reflects citizens instead of corporate welfare and play palaces.
Sioux Falls City Council Agenda • May 7-8, 2019
City Council Informational • 4 PM • Tuesday May 7
We will get an update on the Levitt Shell, Future Growth areas and a Water Connection Fee ordinance. There is also an executive session, and if I was a guessing man it’s probably about the parking ramp.
City Council Regular Meeting • 7 PM • Tuesday May 8
Item #7, Approval of Contracts/Agreements
There is an item to renovate the baseball fields at Terrace Park. Wondering when they are going to reset the walkway stones?
There is an item for $50K for legal counsel pertaining to the parking ramp. The FIRM handling it has a division in construction;
We help drive real estate and construction projects forward using innovative strategies to ensure smooth completion and mitigate risk. Our deep bench includes lawyers who advocate when real estate and construction disputes arise,
Item #29, Beer license, new brewery at the Cascade
Item #50, 1st Reading, $1.875 million in surplus going towards 2019 road projects. Interesting, when Stehly suggested extra money for potholes she was told they had enough money budgeted. Now all of sudden roads are getting another big chunk of money.
Item #51, Resolution, Stehly is asking the housing summit doesn’t have a registration fee and be recorded by CityLink. With the current attitude of the council towards Stehly, this will likely fail, but it will be interesting to hear the excuses from the majority. I understand that there should be a fee for food, but that can be separate from the registration fee. The timing of the event is also troublesome. People who need affordable housing the most probably won’t be able to attend on a weekday.
Item #59, Resolution, Jeff Eckhoff will be appointed director of Planning. I believe Jeff will get full support of the council.
Mayor’s State of the City Address • 2 PM • Wednesday May 8 (at the Hub on SE Tech Campus – Correction)
Not only will this meeting NOT be a Carnegie Hall, it seems it will be live streamed on FB instead of on Citylink or via SIRE on the city website. Not sure how I feel about that. The mayor is probably doing the SOC at the Hub to talk about the proposed community college, which I think is a great idea if they can keep tuition and education debt low.