Last night during the public input time at the council meeting Vitaliy Strizheus who owns an unfinished house the city is scheduled to demolish on Monday came to plead his case to the council and public. I have avoided posting about this because 1) I really don’t care about the lifestyles of the rich and famous of Sioux Falls and 2) I do not know the details of the case including accusations that the city is discriminating based on race and what Constitutional property rights he may have. The city has a track record on this after ignoring their own building codes and allowing an oversized mansion to be built in McKennan Park.
Hopefully a Federal judge will block the demolition so we can get a clearer understanding of what is going on. But taking 10 years to complete a home is unacceptable and there should be consequences. Not sure charging taxpayers $85K to demolish and all the litigation expenses is really beneficial to the defendant or the public. I think this could have been solved in a different manner. Why can’t the city just take the home and sell it on auction?
But what I found most intriguing is while this guy is begging the city to spare his home he dawns a gold watch. He should have taken a queue from this guy at last week’s public input complaining about the uselessness of the pothole hotline. Maybe Carhartt Kent had a gold watch under his coveralls but I am guessing NOT.
Item #36, A RESOLUTION APPROVING THE 2022 SIOUX FALLS TRANSIT DEVELOPMENT PLAN.
During discussion before the vote, Rich Merkouris suggested FREE fare for our public transit system. He acknowledged it would be a heavy lift to get the public on board but when we are only collecting $500K a year in fares and spending $7 million a year on the program, what’s the point? Just think with the money we are spending on the 6th Street Bunker Bridge and the DSU research facility we could have had 40 years of FREE fares. Councilor Starr and Merkouris both suggested that the frequency and usage of the transit system needs to improve and experimenting with different approaches, like FREE fares, may get us better results. There was a suggestion that city officials have been sitting on their hands for the past 20 years when it comes to transit. I would disagree. They are not sitting on their hands they are using them to spread their butt cheeks so their heads can easily be placed.
To be honest with you, I think our current public transit system is beyond fixable. I would much rather see the city dismantle the whole system and bring in a new contractor.
Amber Hansen, Reyna Hernandez and Darcy Millette sent the statement to Sioux Falls Live in advance of a meeting of the Visual Arts Commission, which meets at 9 a.m.
“We are grateful to the Sioux Falls Arts Council, the Visual Arts Commission, and MarketBeat for their support during the city’s selection process for the 10th Street parking garage mural. As of now, we do not know the reason behind the Mayor’s decision to override the VAC’s unanimous selection of our design, ‘Buffalo Dreamer.’
“As local artists and community focused muralists, we are disappointed by the exploitation of time, energy, and resources that the city’s process demanded from those it claims to serve. Despite our disappointment in what has transpired, we are hopeful that this experience ignites a conversation surrounding issues of transparency and systemic power plays concerning who determines and shapes the arts and culture in the city of Sioux Falls and throughout the state of South Dakota.”
I was glad to see they acknowledged their disappointment in the process. What has NOT surfaced is the actual rejected image. I doubt we will ever see it.
This is why I have pushed back on the mayor having a full-time arts coordinator in his office. Decisions about public art should take a village, not a dictator.
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The VAC will be meeting at 9 AM at the City Center Admin building downtown in City Center Conference Room 110. There isn’t really anything special about the agenda except for public input could get interesting.
There has been a lot of hoopla surrounding the rejected Bunker Ramp mural project. But without knowing what the rejected mural looks like (there have been several accusations that it was insensitive towards Native Americans and the LGBTQ+ community) it is hard to make a judgement call as to if this all to do about nothing.
Some have said that the image cannot be released due to artist permissions and copyright infringement, but my experience with being in a juried exhibit or competition those rights can be waived. I have not seen the image but I encourage the artists to release the image to the public so that the public can make that call.
Transparency goes a long ways, and in the case of rejected art, showing the image to the public would bring a greater understanding of what the artists intended and what the jurors and mayor perceived.
I doubt these three artists worked this hard to win the selection only to dupe the public into a secret plan to offend them with controversial art. If you think that you truly are ignorant to how the process of creating art works. It’s not like they suggested putting a statue of a naked dude in DTSF for 50 years.
I struggle with the notion that 6 members of the VAC who unanimously approved the initial concept would be so naive to move forward with a piece of art that would offend a certain group of people.
Me thinks the only people offended by the concept are not really affected by it’s message just butt hurt they were NOT honored and obeyed.
*for the record, I found out about this when a friend of mine casually said, ‘Have you heard what is going on with the parking ramp mural?’ I said no. So I decided to go read the agenda minutes from the VAC meetings and found a missing narrative in the January meeting. Not only were the minutes initially missing as to what the planning director discussed about the mural, the agenda page incorrectly listed it as a Jan 11 meeting instead of Jan 17. I contacted someone who may have been in attendance and they confirmed to me that the planning director came to the meeting and told the VAC the mayor had selected the other mural concept. This is another reason I have suggested that ALL city board/commission meetings be recorded and live streamed on YouTube.
The Mayor has the right to reject the recommendation, just like the city council has the right to reject zoning proposals from the planning commission. What he cannot do is bully all of the participants that were involved in this long and complicated process.
You know the old saying, “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it just may be a duck.” which should be followed by the sayings “Follow the money.” and “Pay to play.”
Sioux Falls city attorney Stacy Kooistra is becoming the new chief operating officer and general counsel for the Dakota State University-Applied Research Corporation.
Kooistra will begin his duties this spring and will be based in Sioux Falls.
Last year when the city pledged $10 million to the project for ‘landscaping and other stuff’ according to DSU’s president in a city council presentation, it seems someone is receiving the benefits of that gift.
The city certainly won’t be in dire straits if Mr. Kooistra leaves since most of the heavy lifting in that department is done by staff attorneys and outside counsel (in which the city spends millions each year by hiding legal budgets throughout multiple departments instead of having a centralized legal fund in the finance department).
Kooistra has also been rumored to take extensive leave for his military commitments (while still receiving city compensation, PTO and benefits) which is protected by Federal Law but has left the office in disarray. Just look at Stacy’s misguided opinions on the 1st Amendment and prior restraint or the multiple typos on council agenda items culminating into misleading legal statements presented to the council on the 6th Street Bunker Bridge vote.
But the timing of this promotion is what is dubious. The city announced a little less then a year ago they would be committing $10 million to the project and even after the president of DSU really didn’t know what the money would be used for the rubber stamp council approved the pledge. After TenHaken enjoyed four endorsed council victories in the city election last spring it seems he has been on a ramrodding spree to do whatever he wants including this suddenly mysterious promotion of Kooistra to the very institution that is receiving millions of dollars from Sioux Falls taxpayers and the city he currently serves (ironically to a guy who doesn’t even live in Sioux Falls city limits).
So is this a conflict of interest? Does a duck quack?
With the weather getting it’s thaw on I have been trying to get my bike riding miles in, and it has been glorious. Yesterday I went on an extensive bike trail ride (my 4th in a week). While I like to bitch a lot about city services, the city deserves a gold star on plowing the bike trail. Don’t be fooled by winter. I have seen walkers, joggers, bike riders and pet enthusiasts on the trail and we are extremely fortunate to have the city plow our bike trail. Thank You!
l3wis 
