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SF City Council

SF City Council Sioux Falls

Sioux Falls City Council Agenda, June 19, 2018

l3wis 3Comments

CITY COUNCIL INFORMATIONAL • 4 PM

Several topics for conversation.

There is an update about Falls Park Safety, as I understand it, the city hired outside counsel to get advice on how to move forward. Not even sure what that means.

There is a presentation about the Planning Department and ‘Who they are.”

SECOG does yearly presentation and Councilor Kiley does update on Veterans Cemetery.

CITY COUNCIL REGULAR MEETING • 7 PM

Public Input will be the hot topic of the evening, yet there are some other important topics.

Item #105, 2nd Reading of moving Public Input to back of the meeting. As I understand it they are planning to defer this item instead of killing it. The reason? They (5 councilors) want to keep this in their toolbox in case the council doesn’t approve Item #106 as a ‘threat’. Yeah, what a great way to govern. It should be killed.

Item #106, 1st reading, compromise on public input. There are several good ideas in this measure. Including allowing public input at 1st and 2nd reading and limiting time and speakers. They will have to amend the portion about allowing visuals using the overhead. Hopefully this will get passed without little pissing and moaning. I do know that the 3 councilors that were left out of the process to begin with (Brekke, Stehly and Starr) are NOT happy about how this came about, but are willing to move forward, but I’m guessing they will be expressing their opinions about how unprofessional the actions of the other five were and how this does NOTHING to solve the problem of disruption. In a way, I feel sorry for Mayor TenHaken being pulled into this. I think he wanted change, but I also think he had very little to do with the proposed legislation. As councilor Selberg pointed out last week, they had been working on this before the election. Our council needs to start working together, and I hope this is the LAST time they pull behind the scenes negotiations, especially ones that are possible violations of open meetings laws. Also, TenHaken needs to put on the big boy pants and gavel disruptions moving forward. He can be nice guy 6 days a week, but on Tuesday he needs to take charge.

Item #113, Resolution. New appointments to various citizen boards.

Item #115, Consent to re-appoint city directors. It surprises me that 3 former mayor holdovers will remain. Parks Director, Don Kearney, who was the Former Mayor Bucktooth and Bowlcut’s chief deceiver and liar. Everything from mowing lists that don’t exist and deceptions about an indoor pool. Jill Franken, Health Director, who concocted the awful contract with Paramedics Plus and cover up of phantom ambulances and Sue Quanbeck-Etten who has done absolutely nothing to improve IT services to the citizens of Sioux Falls and carried the water for the administration building we did not need. Hopefully TenHaken will see the light and let them go eventually.

Item #116, Consent for Mayoral Successors. As you may know, if our mayor resigns suddenly, has serious health issues or dies he must have a successor until a special election can be held. His list is interesting, but not surprising;

1. Chief of Staff, Erica Beck

2. Public Works Director, Mark Cotter

3. HR Director, Bill Dah’Toole

4. Health Director, Jill Bride of Franken

5. Planning Director, Mike Cooper

1st Amendment SF City Council Sioux Falls

UPDATE: Why Public Input was moved to the beginning

l3wis 8Comments

UPDATE: It seems the Argus Ed Board agrees, don’t move public input.

These are the original Council Meetings (1st and 2nd readings) when public input was moved. It was sponsored by Councilors Kevin Kavanaugh and Curtis Rust. There was ZERO discussion on 1st and 2nd readings, and ALL 8 councilors voted for it. Kevin basically said, “We are here to do the public’s business. We should hear from them first.”

Funny how a good idea had NO opposition when passed 16 years ago. Just another reason why it needs to be left alone.

Minutes, etc, from meetings: 08192001 Minutes – Item 24 Minutes 09032002 – Item 18 Ord 68-02

FF 57:00 (1st Reading)

FF 2:30:00 (2nd Reading) If you go to end of the meeting, where Public Input used to be, you will see Cathy and Melanie Bliss thank the council for moving it, and Mayor Munson apologizes to them for having to wait in the past.

Downtown Sioux Falls Railroads Rapid City SF City Council Sioux Falls

We should have negotiated RR quiet zones Downtown

l3wis 0Comments

Rapid City is showing they have a lot more vision than Sioux Falls by proposing quiet zones Downtown;

The city’s railroad quiet zone task force will meet next week to discuss funding for the project. A final report is expected within the next two months.

City officials will need to file a notice of intent with the Federal Railroad Administration and railroad companies once a quiet zone option is approved.

Harrington said Rapid City would be the first town or city in the state to implement a railroad quiet zone policy should it move forward.

As I have stated numerous times, the RR Redevelopment Project in DTSF was one of the worst negotiated projects in the history of the city. Besides the fact that we probably bought land from the RR that we probably already owned (Federal easements) we did nothing to limit train traffic DT or at least limit the noise. Of the millions we handed over to the RR for basically $62 a square foot dirty land, we didn’t have the vision to set aside some money to create quiet zones downtown. This SHOULD have been a part of the deal.

DECIBAL PROBLEM STILL OCCURRING DOWNTOWN

I was surprised to see the problems are still around;

Neitzert said he may wait to see if the ICON has any issues throughout the summer and in the meantime, slow the tempo on composing a new ordinance, but still thinks downtown maybe eventually need to change its key.

“It does seem like downtown needs something different, because the noise ordinance is written really well for other areas that aren’t mixed use, neighborhoods that are all residential,” Neitzert said. “But again the question is, what is the something?”

Ironically its airplanes, trains and first responders that cause the most noise, the decibel level does need to change downtown, funny how this stuff gets killed without little explanation. Kind of like moving public input without an informal public meeting about it. I had the opportunity to go inside one of the bigger condos in the building. While this one did not have a west side patio, it did have several west side windows. I was there for about an hour and the only sound I could hear from outside was a faint police car siren that was driving past the coliseum, but it was so faint you would not even notice it. I’m thinking having the patios on the west side are what may be causing some of the noise issues. My suggestion? Close you patio door.

1st Amendment Open Government Open Meetings SF City Council Sioux Falls

UPDATE: Mayor TenHaken’s compromises to the City Council on Public Input

l3wis 21Comments

UPDATE: Mayor TenHaken will be on Lalley at 4 PM today to talk about compromise.

Paul is offering these compromises to Public Input, and as I understand it they will be on Tuesday’s agenda for amendments;

A compromise will show unity and leadership by you as council and I would encourage you to bring forward an amendment or new ordinance as follows:

  1. Public input stays in the current spot on the agenda.
  2. Provide thirty minutes for general public input unrelated to first and second reading of items.
  3. Three minutes of allotted time per speaker during public input.
  4. The meeting chair has the discretion to allow first time speakers and those who speak infrequently to approach the podium before those who are frequent public input speakers.
  5. Public input will be encouraged on first readings of ordinances. This should not extend the length of meetings as it will likely cut down the time of input on second readings and shift it to first readings, plus public input is often for first reading items.
  6. Cards will be available for the public to provide written comment in case there is not enough time for them to approach the Council or they would prefer to write the council rather than publicly address the group. The meeting chair shall direct these individuals to use the cards as needed and provide their contact information. Contact cards for the Council should also be available for constituents to contact them.
  7. Electronic presentations using the Chamber audio/visual equipment will no longer be allowed. If citizens need a visual for the Council, they may distribute paper copies not exceeding 11×17 inches in size.

Most of it I don’t have an issue with, except #7. But that isn’t the real problem here, the real issue is not having a public conversation about it.

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