SF City Council

There will never be ‘Regular People’ serving in Sioux Falls city government ever again

We saw the writing on the wall when Alex Jensen and his cabal of donors had to spend $127K to beat a self-employed piano teacher by around 90 votes. The regular guy/gal is no longer allowed to compete.

Just look at the usual donors on the financial reports (someone should tell Andera that she can’t add her smaller contributions up twice 🙂

It is the same group of rich Republican businessmen and mysterious dark PACs (so some of these rich people can hide their identities) that are once again funding the campaigns of the NON-regular people (except Islam who seems to have half the state of Michigan gunning for her and they all work at the same hospital 🙂

You have to chuckle when Clowncilor Marshall Selfish actually suggested that the reason the members needed a bigger salary is so more regular people could run. That’s rich considering he never mentioned that you actually need the money up front.

We could change this with a couple of easy steps;

• Get rid of the Home Rule Charter as it exists and give more power back to council and,

• Publicly finance the races so everyone is on the same playing field.

We of course first must throw out the current charter, and there is a stew brewing on that one along with some other goodies I will share very soon.

So it looks like we will have yet another city election where a handful of people vote for the very people who are lining their pockets with donations from the banksters, bondsters and developers that are turning our city into a corporate welfare state.

This is the current lineup for the election;

Mayoral Race; Paul TenHaken, David Zokaites, Taneeza Islam

Central District; Curt Soehl (No challengers)

Southeast District; David Barranco (No Challengers)

At Large (A); Janet Brekke, Bobbi Andera, Dr. Sarah Cole

At Large (B); Rich Merkouris, Pam Cole

Zeal lease contract with the City of Sioux Falls is based on empty promises

Before we dive into the current proposed agreement (Item #18) watch these videos from 2018 (FF to 9:30 in the first Q & A and listen to the Mayor’s answer about personal guarantee);

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m9clehpI2XE&t=496s

So why do I bring this up? The deal that took place back than echoes what is going on with ZEAL.

Let me make this clear, I SUPPORT, Zeal & StartUp Sioux Falls moving to this building, I support their vision for the facility, I even kind of support the $1 a year lease. But let’s face it, most people in this city are worried about where their next paycheck and meal is coming from and not starting a business so there is absolutely NO reason the taxpayers need to partner with them. In fact DTSF has several private properties available for a facility like this without the city needing to get involved.

The main issue with the deal is the handshake promise that they will spend $1 million remodeling the building. It is true that in the contract they will be responsible for general maintenance and have to carry insurance, but like the Bunker Ramp deal there is NOTHING in writing that they must spend this money, even though the city promises to reimburse them if they break the lease. The mayor also has authority of what improvements can be made, which is good. But like the deal with Jeff Lamont that was based on a flimsy piece of paper that he was ‘good for the money’ ZEAL has NOTHING in writing they will spend the $1 million.

Did we learn nothing from the $26 million dollar pile of cement?

What baffles me is that while this mayor and the past one claim they are running the city like a business, NO ONE in the private sector would sign a contract like this if the promises were not in writing and approved by their legal counsel.

This is just another handshake deal between the mayor and his rich buddies with NO (legal) accountability, and while it frustrates me these backroom deals persist, I think for the most part the massive conflicts of interest sadden me when we could have just done better. I know the mayor shares a deep friendship with some of the individuals involved, but this isn’t the mayor personally borrowing his lawn mower to a buddy, this is a tax payer owned asset and we must dot the I’s and cross the T’s to protect OUR asset NOT the mayor’s friend’s asses.

Some may argue that this is NOT like the Bunker Ramp deal, which when it comes to value, they are correct. But when it comes to a private/public partnership almost everything is identical, including nothing in writing. We just don’t seem to learn from (recent) history when it comes to contracts with these partnerships like the cost overruns and shoddy work with the Pavilion, Admin Building, Events Center, Midco Aquatic Center and Bunker Ramp. I have even heard there are now millions in cost overruns with the Water Treatment and Public Safety facilities that are not even completed yet.

I don’t expect my council and mayor to be geniuses when it comes to these negotiations, but at least look at history and rely on your 6-Figure a year staff to give top notch advice and draw up contracts that value accountability.

City of Sioux Falls Finally gets it together on housing, maybe?

So after our unemployment rates drops to almost zero, and we have more warehouse jobs than workers, the city finally engages on a housing plan, read it HERE.

While Director Matt Tobias’ (not sure what his title is since the Poops Admin likes to make up fancy titles every 3 months) presentation was the best I am not sure why it took a decade and a massive board to finally implement a plan just a couple of months from a city election. Matt made great points that I have been harping about for years like promoting the community development programs, increasing the income level of qualification and pushing for up to $30K loans at 0% interest.

Like I said, glad to see the wheels turning, but I am also wondering why it took so long. We have known for over a decade that the city was growing at an enormous rate and density in our core was crucial. Many administrations, private non-profits, councilors and developers have talked about it. In fact I attempted to bring in the Strongtown’s founder over 10 years ago to speak on it, but I couldn’t get enough people to help donate to his gas money and hotel room. When he eventually came, I had to chuckle when people said to me if I had heard of him.

I will tell you why it has taken so long to get the ball rolling; GREED and the cornfields are running out.

Just listen to what Greg Neitzert said about it, once again defending the developers and contractors and how gosh darn it, they need to make money or the plan won’t work. I agree, anyone in business for themselves needs to make a profit and they need to eat, but I have rarely met a large developer in this town that is living in central Sioux Falls in a 900 sq ft home. With their profit margins, no state income tax, low labor costs and multiple tax incentives, they do ok. There is absolutely NO reason why they can’t do projects in the core building density and NOT make money.

I also look at this as LOCAL economic development. Most of the smaller contractors that do this kind of work are local, they live here, their workers live here and likely they buy materials and tools here. That all gets recirculated into the economy.

Don’t fool yourself, these policies have been researched for a long time, but like most things in this city and even country, if someone can’t figure out how to gouge the consumer the feckless leaders don’t act. This is one of the main reasons it infuriated me that they are asking for a raise. I guess they think they need to be paid more for doing less.

Puff Piece on Poops

Even though this interview was more like a grade school softball game, there were some interesting parts;

“We all thought when we got the vaccine in January that COVID was done and we were going to move on and it was going to be 2020 (that was) the year we wanted to forget, and 2021 has been more of the same,” TenHaken said.
“It’s almost like the year of deja vu.”

That’s because in order for the vaccine to work, you have to actually get it. Weird how science and medicine works. And when our fearless leader who promotes everything from gravy, dad jokes and mentorship pushes that job off on the private healthcare providers don’t be surprised when things don’t change.


“They’re not all law-abiding citizens,” TenHaken said. “So we doubled down on public safety initiatives, whether it’s the training center, opening a report-to-work location or adding staffing resources with a behavioral health community resource officer and our first six months of The Link, which indirectly is a public safety initiative because we’re trying to keep people out of jail who don’t need to be in jail but need other kinds of help.

Funny how Poops still can’t say the ‘P’ word (Precinct). He also doesn’t mention what he is doing about our homeless and panhandling issues, let me fill you in; NOTHING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! And he refuses to ask for the community’s help and engagement.

Downtown also is the site of what the mayor calls “one of my biggest personal disappointments of my first term.”
The unfinished multiuse parking ramp project along 10th Street east of Phillips Avenue has been tangled in a legal dispute between the city and developers since 2019.


The irony is that THIS Mayor and City Council had the power to cancel the project and the bonding (we would have had to pay a fine  . . . which is ironic;

“I want people to know we are laser-focused in trying to get to a resolution,” TenHaken said. “I wish we could talk about it more and talk about it publicly because I think people think we’re sitting on our hands waiting for something to happen, and we’re not. There’s not a week that goes by that we’re not engaged in some kind of activity trying to bring closure. In 2022, I’m confident there’s going to be significant action in that.”

It is ironic, because the rumor going around is that the DEVELOPER (not plural) has been telling people the city will be paying him off to go away, and they want to do it in complete silence without the assistance of the council. So why didn’t we just pay the fine initially on the bonds? Because the bonding companies (we only use basically one in the city and state) have complete control of our elected leaders instead of the other way around. Let’s just say they have many ‘tools in their toolbox’ to use against governments that don’t want to cooperate with the Godfather of Bonds and there was no way in Hell they were going let a $26 million dollar bond be taken off the table.

The ramp itself is cash-flowing, he added.
“We’re not losing money. It’s not costing a red cent to have it sit there like that.


We are actually losing out on property tax revenue, so in essence we are losing money and no doubt when the project gets handed over to another developer (which we all know who that will be) there will likely be tax incentives and a possible TIF, so we will again be losing more money. Besides the Railroad Redevelopment deal (which never got rid of a single train DT) the bunker ramp is a prime example of how poorly negotiated the deal was. Even though the public and other business people threw out multiple red flags over multiple years and administrations and councilors they still went full on. To this day NO elected official or city director involved has apologized for the colossal F’Up. I think they all should have resigned. When I hear certain folks tell me that government should run like a private business, I point to this mess DT and tell them, that is the result of such a foolish philosophy.

Sioux Falls City Council needs to repeal the E-Bike ordinances on Bike Trail

As we saw this past year, CountCilor Alex ‘$127K’ Jensen tried to slip by a deal for one of his business friends to allow electric foot scooters on DTSF sidewalks. They are already allowed in our city, but sidewalks, not so much.

I do agree with one aspect of the Count’s attempt, E-vehicles for recreation like skateboards, One-Wheels, bikes and foot scooters are the fastest growing industry in the country and because it is growing so fast, it is constantly changing. But we are being held back.

A few years ago the city council decided to wring their hands over this (they do piss around a lot with stuff that will be obsolete in a few years, you know, like $26 million dollar bunker ramps to no where).

They decided the problem with the bike trail wasn’t strollers going down the middle of the trail, dogs running about off the leash or people training for the Ironman do 30 MPH down the trail they decided it was those evil E-2 bikers. Well they are a problem, but there is a better solution.

Since the passage of only E-1 vs. E-2 (nobody can really tell the difference) the real issue on the trail is SPEED, courteous behavior and awareness and not classification. As I have mentioned in the past, there are all kinds of E-Vehicles on the trail, I am not sure we can control that.

So what is the solution? It can be accomplished by 3 simple changes to the ordinance;

• Repeal the current ordinance in it’s entirety, or at least certain parts;

§ 95.031  BICYCLING.   Bicycle and e-bicycle riders in the parks and upon recreation trails shall abide by the ordinances governing the operation and equipment of bicycles except bicycling and Class I e-bicycling need not be limited to paved areas. Bicyclists and e-bicyclists shall operate their bicycles or e-bicycles in a prudent manner and with due regard for the safety of others and the preservation of park property.(1992 Code, § 27-16.13)  (Ord. 49-99, passed 4-19-1999; Ord. 118-18, passed 12-18-2018; Ord. 66-19, passed 6-18-2019)

§ 95.031.1  WHEELED MOTOR VEHICLES PROHIBITED ON RECREATION TRAIL.   It shall be unlawful for any person to drive or operate any motorized or motor driven, wheeled vehicle except a Class I e-bicycle on any of the recreation trails. This section shall not apply to or limit authorized vehicles on the levees for maintenance, patrolling, and flood emergency purposes.

• Create a speed limit on the trail. (I am not sure what that should be, but research would probably suggest 15 MPH. We could also put up speed signs about ever 1-2 miles with a solar detector telling your speed).

• Allow ALL E-Vehicle transportation (prohibiting gas/electric motorcycles, ATVs and scooters)

One of the main reasons to support this is because of what Jensen said, TOURISM!

Also, the bike trail is one of our greatest assets in Sioux Falls. I constantly shake my head with all the money we dump into concrete along the river greenway when we could be spending this money to improve this gem instead like solar lighting, 24/7 commuting, and dual trails for walkers and bikers. We could make this asset even better.

It’s time to start again and simplify our recreation trail rules and regulations.