South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

Sioux Falls Parks and Rec

Christ christmas Downtown Sioux Falls Mayor TenHaken SF City Council Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Parks and Rec

The Year in Review, oh, and Merry Christmas!

l3wis 3Comments

I used to be against Winter Wonderland at Falls Park but I have to admit, the pics on my bike this year have been good, so I guess I am okay with the city spending the same amount of money on this as what it would cost to refurbish the Brockhouse Collection ($850K). Speaking of that, saw an email this week from an influential party wanting to help save the collection and the city council and mayor have ignored them for over a year. I know, shocker.

Anyway, down to business. Instead of me wasting my time and a 12 pack of IPA’s this year with the year in review I am asking on my readers to paste in the comments their favorite post, OR, just tell me what was the best DaCola gem of the year.

Moving on, Merry Christmas or whatever weirdo holiday you celebrate. Believe it or not I will be sitting in a church pew on Christmas morning pretending to be a Christian (I do that a couple times a year). I do like Christmas and all the Kuchen I can eat!!!! (and it better have fried eggs floating on top!)

So this year was Detroit’s year of Laziness. If I didn’t have to do it, I did not do it. In fact I have been studying minimalism this past year but I can’t even do that right. I call myself a lazy minimalist. I refrain, half of the time 🙂

Here are some basic rules;

• If I can walk or bike, I do that

• If I can cook at home (for less), I do that

• I turn my heat down to 68 degrees

• I turn my AC to 75

• I only use lights in my house in the room I am in

• I only take 2 showers a week during the winter

• I only buy clothes and other stuff at thrift stores (books, music, appliances, art supplies)

• I enjoy the company of good friends and conversation over casinos

• Beer instead of wine (cheap liquor is ok)

• Personal hair clipper (I still get my hair cut from a barber, but I only go about every 4 months because I trim it everyday)

• A pet (I don’t have one now, but have been thinking about it again. They can actually save you money because you find yourself hanging with your bud instead of farting around at the bars and friends that talk back)

• Pay it forward. (this is the most important principal of minimalism and the hardest one you will ever do, but totally worth it.)

I wanna give a big shout out to my partner in crime, uh, I mean, not crime, my web developer. Some know him, most do not, but he has been with me since the beginning including getting me into blogging in the late 90’s. Let’s just say my previous moniker ‘Fat Midget’ was not loved. Let’s keep killing it Bro! What else do we have to do on a Wednesday at 11:18 AM? Oh, that’s right . . . PPPPPPIIIIIIIIEEE!!!!!!!!

Bike Trail SF City Council Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Parks and Rec South Dakotans

South Dakota Ranks 45th in Bicycle friendliness

l3wis 9Comments

H/T to Jordan Deffenbaugh for posting this on Turdbook;

While Sioux Falls as a city ranks a lot better, we do have work to do, trust me, someone who rides a ton in this town knows. What I found most astounding was the ZERO in Planning. I would think there would be at least ONE legislator pro bicycle. I guess I need to take Jamison out for a coffee 🙂 and a bike ride.

WE MISSED AN OPPORTUNITY WITH JORDAN

Speaking of Jordan, I see what his opponent has done so far and I am completely disappointed that the voters didn’t see what a great package we would have gotten with Jordan. Maybe Thomason will wake up after New Years, stranger things have happened, like watching Councilor Miranda ‘Lucy’ Bayse vote for a property tax increase next year. This is going to be fun.

Miranda Bayse SF City Council Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Parks and Rec

Is the Sioux Falls City Council communicating with City Hall?

l3wis 4Comments

After watching the above presser where Councilor Miranda ‘Lucy’ Bayse said this, I wonder if the council is talking to city hall;

There isn’t anything that’s proposed that would increase the tax expectations or increase what community members would pay in their taxes to fund these things.

Over the last couple of years when the city council has discussed NOT raising property taxes (they always vote for the increase) the mayor’s minions have cried to the council if we don’t raise the taxes every year we would miss out on rec programming, street repair and any other bogeyman they can cook up. So how can Lucy say there won’t be any increases in taxes to pay for services? She can’t. She is either lying or doesn’t understand how the funding works. While we have a bond rating based on our 2nd penny collection, we also have other bond ratings tied to our total revenue take in which also consists of Federal and State grants and property taxes. While the bond itself to pay for the facility is attached to the 2nd penny some of the programming will come from property tax revenue. So where is the disconnect? You will pay more in ALL taxes to fund these facilities, does the council think the money is coming from the sky? Seriously? It will cost MILLIONS each year to subsidize these facilities, the money is coming from somewhere.

Instead of lying to the public to justify the means why not stop the hand wringing and propaganda and put it to a legal bond vote. If you really want to know what the public thinks, ASK THEM!

Downtown Sioux Falls Mayor TenHaken Phillips to the Falls Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Parks and Rec

UPDATE: Falls Park or The Falls? What’s the difference?

l3wis 4Comments

UPDATE: Still gathering the tea leaves on this one but what I have heard so far is that the design was done internally (even though the city usually hires that sorta thing out to you know, Poops’ former ad agency). I’m still trying to figure out which one of Poops’ marketing goons in city hall proposed this. I still think they should have named it ‘STAY OUT OF THE FOAM PARK’.

So a few weeks ago I was riding thru Falls Park (I usually do a couple rides a day thru DTSF just to see what projects are going) and I noticed the new sign at Falls Park; this ugly navy blue and orange sign that said ‘The Falls’. Didn’t think much of it because it looked like a temp sign for the Winter Wonderland. I thought one of the local liquor distributors printed it, LOL.

First off, it is called Falls Park, because the Falls are there and it is a park. This is ‘naming’ 101. So I am confused why we wanted to shorten the name, not by much, and create some kind of branding for the park.

I have worked in printing and marketing since 1993 and the best rule of thumb if something isn’t broken don’t fix it. Not sure why we need to rebrand Falls Park? It has been there thousands of years and it’s natural beauty is what makes it.

Now there are upgrades on the horizon, but instead of RE-BRANDING maybe we just need to promote the PARK!

It often cracks me up with Mayor Poops renaming things, but NOT explaining why, because he knows it is just a whim.

I have some feelers out there and hope to have the REAL reason this park was renamed.

As a former city official said to me today; ‘Where were the public meetings to let the public in on renaming the park?’ And this person makes a great point. Let the public in on changing the identity of the park, you might just find some great results. But Authoritarians know everything, just ask them.

When you run a MILITANT ANTI-OPEN GOVERNMENT REGIME, opinions are like diapers.

If I was in charge of re-branding Falls Park I would rip every single piece of concrete out of the park, I would tear down the gift shop and observatory tower and would transform the park into a naturalist site with native flowers, grasses, etc. It would truly be beautiful, and ironically if you used native flowers and grasses, the maintenance would be minimal.

Poops vision is turning the place into Disneyland. How I hate Disneyland.

Downtown Sioux Falls Elections Quality of Life Bonds SF City Council Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Parks and Rec

The Predictability of the Sioux Falls City Council is painful to watch

l3wis 6Comments

Former City Councilor Big T wrote an excellent letter to the editor about how the citizens need to vote on the new parks’ expenditures.

I would agree, $77 million dollars in expenses needs to be decided by the voters and I am surprised that most of the council wouldn’t be pushing for a special election to approve these bonds. They will sit and cry and wring their hands about making these gigantic decisions when they can just easily call for an election and wipe their hands of it.

But the pool debate and some of the other debates the new council has been having has been soooo predictable. They pretend they are ‘concerned’ about the expenditures then vote for them anyway. They are NOT concerned and all these media games they have been playing (because someone may be running for mayor) is just smoke and mirrors. They have done this for decades before they have to do a big project. They promise all kinds of cost cutting and savings then once the project gets approved there are massive cost overruns and add ons. EVERY SINGLE TIME! Just look at the Ice Bunker Ribbon; Supposed to be a $4 million dollar project that turned into a $16 million dollar project (the donor must have needed a bigger tax write-off).

The council is going to make it ‘LOOK’ like they are on our side when it comes to financial concerns, but if they were TRULY listening, they would call a special election, but just like the predictability of their policy decisions, I will predict they will forgo the special election, and likely do an ILLEGAL advisory election with the Convention Center tying the two projects together to better SELL it to the public. I guarantee this is what they are cooking up. They did it with the Pavilion and Convention Center, it’s an old playbook.

Not only do we need to demand a special election for both projects we need it to be a LEGAL bond election where it only passes with 60% of the vote.

I would love to blog more about city politics, but the predictability lately has been a gigantic yawn. Oh, but I guess the mayoral candidates are all jockeying for positions, but I think the Skabs and their less then flattering boozer texts may be instigating all of this.

Next Page »

You Missed

Christ christmas Downtown Sioux Falls Mayor TenHaken SF City Council Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Parks and Rec

The Year in Review, oh, and Merry Christmas!

1st Amendment Developers Development Downtown Sioux Falls religion Riverline District SF City Council Sioux Falls

UPDATE: Why is the city lending a religious organization $500K?

Music USD Vermillion

F’ing USD

Bike Trail Public Utilities Public Works Sioux Falls Uncategorized

Sioux Falls is hostile towards bicyclists and peds