SF City Council

UPDATE: Applicant and City both responsible for special Sioux Falls City Council Meeting

l3wis July 1, 2021 8Comments

UPDATE: I did some digging around on what we learned from the 2019 series (which was smaller than what this year will be). During a presentation at Dem Forum after the 2019 season was done, Nancy Halverson, Director of Levitt said it costs $650K a year to function the Levitt and total alcohol sales in 2019 was $41K. According to the contract in 2019 the alcohol provider had to give a percentage of those sales to the Levitt (I can’t find that amount). It is also important to remember that the taxpayers of Sioux Falls pay for a majority of the grounds keeping on the facility. My point is a majority of the local foundation’s funding comes from private donations and the taxpayers.

Basically it comes down to the applicant thinking there would be another regular meeting in June. As I have mentioned, the city council has skipped 3 weeks of regular meetings. I still think that it is the responsibility of city employees, any city employee to be informing applicants when the council decides to skip 3 weeks of regular meetings. While the applicant did take full blame, he did say it was probably the fault of both him and the licensing agent.

While some may think I am making mountains out of mole hills, as I have mentioned before, these things have happened in the past on several occassions.

But I also don’t fully blame the applicant and Palmer. The city clerk, the city attorney, the city council and the mayor’s office should have never let a span of 3 weeks go by without having a meeting. The city council did meet for a informational on Tuesday June 22. They could easily have had a regular/special meeting right after that one to approve this license (the applicant turned in his application on June 17).

I just struggle with pointing all the fingers at the applicant who I guess is expected to know the city council’s meeting calendar by memory. As I said before, this is what you get with Cruise Control government and poor customer service from city employees. I knew councilors in attendance today would find a way to point the finger at anyone but themselves, our city government is really good at, just look at TenHaken when he talks about he Bunker Ramp, he could have stopped it, but instead he blames Bowlcut and Bucktooth.

Now we have Pass the Buck government. Enjoy your $7 white Zin at the concert.

Sioux Falls City Council has special meeting Thursday morning to bail out the city’s licensing agent . . . again

l3wis June 29, 2021 8Comments

UPDATE: Apparently it was the fault of the applicant. Once I get more information I will post.

City of Sioux Falls Licensing Specialist Jamie Palmer (who mysteriously left the council as an assistant clerk to be promoted after Debra Owen’s termination) has been warned about this several times over the years;

The following alcoholic beverage item is requested for consideration on July 1, 2021.
The application was not received in time for consideration at a regularly-scheduled City
Council Meeting. The item meets the criteria set forth by State Law in which no notice is
required to be published and no hearing needs to be scheduled.

I even remember Erpenbach ripping her a new one about getting her ducks in row so they don’t have to approve these licenses last minute, or after the fact (this really happened). I wonder how many times the city council and mayor’s office are going to tolerate this incompetence before showing her the door? Oh that’s right, if you are a city director, your screwups are unlimited, unless of course your name is Chellee, Jason, Matt, Brad, Mike, TJ or the poor sap who flips people off while filling potholes.

I’m sure the likely excuse will be the city council hasn’t met for 3 weeks in a row for an official meeting, but the Levitt agenda has been out for well over a couple of months, Jamie knew this was coming.

Oh, and why hasn’t the council met in 3 weeks? Good question.

I’m sure we will see the same pointy fingers at Jamie asking her how she continually f’cks this stuff up and little else done about it.

Another symptom of cruise control government.

I still have to snicker a bit they are approving a liquor license, at a special meeting, at 10:30 in the morning on a Thursday. Well it’s NOON somewhere!