[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8yteMugRAc0[/youtube]

We are certainly in a Boom Town, if you are one of the ‘Specials’.

No mention of First Premier, marketing the worst, subprime CC in the nation;

A former executive who spent 15 years with Citibank

Oh, he gets around to it;

Then I went to Europe and then came back to South Dakota to work at Premier Bank with Denny Sanford. I quit in 2009 to pursue my dream to be in public service.

Bank? Nice little line, you worked for the card division, Pinnochio. Quit? More like you got caught pursuing public office . . . then . . . quit . . . ahem.

Looking at your unemployment numbers, with the exception of a brief spike in 2010 when the rate went up to 6 percent, it’s surprising that more people don’t move here.

They don’t move here, because of the low wages and under-employment. Most people have multiple jobs. I get so tired of Mike waving that 3.5% unemployment rate around like it is the only part of the story. We have low unemployment, because people have to work their asses off to make ends meet.

Oh and this is interesting;

This year, we will blow away the record for construction in a single year. We’re already 150 percent of where we were last year, and last year was the second-highest construction year in our city’s history.

WOW! Yet we are handing out TIF’s like candy and developers are contributing very little to platting fees to help pay for arterial roads. If we are in a ‘building boom’, which we are, why do we have to handout all these incentives? It seems the developers are having their cake and eating it too.

Fifty years ago, whoever the leaders were decided to put two private country clubs side by side in what is now the heart of our city. Now we have a challenge driving from the east side of town to the west side of town because of that decision.

Then fix it. I have said all along, you could put a road through there using ED, or even working with the Country Clubs. Either way, it is possible. If we took it, we could turn it into a wonderful state park with campsites available. How wonderful it would be to have campgrounds in the middle of our city? I have often said this project should have been pursued over an EC. It would definately have a greater economic impact on our city.

Here’s another thing: Our city council insists we have at least 25 percent of our operating expenses in a reserve fund every year. Right now we’re at about 36 percent. Name another town in America that is repairing streets, rebuilding infrastructure, tackling growth needs for a community, and adding to their city’s piggy bank. We have added to our city’s reserve every year for the last three years.

Nevermind most of that money in the reserves is BORROWED, and the city is $400 million in debt.

That was one of my dreams when I moved back here from San Antonio—I wanted to create a downtown where people would want to live.

I don’t give Munson much credit for anything, but the expansion of DT is because of him and Carol Pagones (sp?) not MMM. If Mike was so enthusiastic about growth DT, he would have finished the RR relocation project already and either built the EC downtown, or moved the CC downtown. He has done neither. He has successfully given TIF’s like candy to DT developers, and turned the $5 million River Greenway project into an over $15 million private landscaping project for private developers.

The spin in this article doesn’t surprise me. MMM only gives you the positive side of things, and I guess I am always the cynic. But folks, cynicism is reality. Bullshit is Bullshit.

15 Thoughts on “MMM mentioned in his CIP address yesterday, we are a Boom Town

  1. Curious George on July 3, 2013 at 2:21 pm said:

    Is your ice cream too cold?

  2. Poly43 on July 3, 2013 at 7:16 pm said:

    Any growth SF has had in the last thirty years can be attributed to janklow and his usury laws. Be proud SF. Be real proud.

    http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/credit/

  3. rufusx on July 3, 2013 at 9:06 pm said:

    A challenge to getting from one part of town to another is the mountain range that divides the Northern half of LA from its Southern half – not a one-mile wide pair of golf courses. Good grief.

  4. hornguy on July 4, 2013 at 12:50 am said:

    I know. Every time people here complain about traffic I’m reminded of when I used to live in Miami and would bring books to read if I had to drive I-95 during rush hour. Not books on tape. Actual books.

    Whenever someone talks about those golf courses I just chuckle. The only way it’d even be worth talking to the golf courses is if the city was prepared to turn 26th into an arterial. But the fireworks with the golf courses wouldn’t be nearly as interesting as watching the city try to use eminent domain to claim a hundred homes or so all the way from Kiwanis to 229 to make the necessary roadway expansions. Otherwise, what the heck is the point? So that we can funnel eastbound traffic on 26th to 12th or 41st via Kiwanis? When they can already do that on Marion, or 29?

    I thought this was the blog where people carped about the power and reach of the city government, but now our host flippantly talks about eminent domain like it ain’t no thing. I guess when it comes to land use policy, the driving factor on this blog is whether the end result helps or screws over rich people and developers.

    But on the flip side, what could possibly be better than having a bunch of idiots driving their giant RV’s and towing their friggin’ campers to this proposed urban camping oasis? Because that’s what will improve traffic safety and flow around our most heavily traveled streets: people taking their motorhomes to Chili’s.

    I might take out petitions for an advisory referendum on this just because I think the debate would be outstanding to watch.

  5. l3wis on July 4, 2013 at 12:45 pm said:

    We could also parcel and sell the land after we build the road, trust me, this project would pay for itself if we did that. Either way, one of these days the city is going to have to face reality and put a road through there. I know Hanson tried and got the shit kicked out of him for proposing it. The point of me bringing this up is because MMM talks about how ‘dumb’ it was, but has no plan to look at it. It’s doable. If we can hornswaggle people into building an EC we don’t need, we can get support for this also.

  6. rufusx on July 4, 2013 at 3:29 pm said:

    It will NEVER – trust me on this – I mean actually literally NEVER – happen. You can float by on your heavenly cloud 300 years from now and check it and see – NEVER. Not even a good idea. Doable =/= sane.

  7. pathloss on July 4, 2013 at 11:07 pm said:

    Huether landed on the best of times. Were it not for new business focus in the midwest, he’d be in trouble. The average citizen will wonder what happened when debt puts the city at double D credit rating. Huether will escape and the poor honest realistic mayor afterward will discover the only escape is bankruptcy. Devils such as Huether always move on into new fake scenarios and undeserved fame.

  8. pathloss on July 4, 2013 at 11:13 pm said:

    Model leaders tell truth because it’s easiest to tell. Huether types tell lies people want to hear and change details along the way so that the end result is what should have never happened.

  9. Testor15 on July 5, 2013 at 1:56 pm said:

    The center of Sioux Falls is changing away from the historical core. Fewer citizens will care if there is a shortcut from the mall area to downtown through the golf courses.

    As long as we subscribe to the sprawl growth model we might as well face the fact there will not be another core route to downtown from the west side.

  10. rufusx on July 6, 2013 at 11:20 am said:

    Even taking a grow up – not out approach to development would NOT lead to a 26th street surface street personal vehicle “shortcut” through the country clubs. That approach would instead emphasize increasing public transit options – not increasing personal vehicle options.

  11. rufusx on July 6, 2013 at 11:23 am said:

    BTW – from the historical perspective of a born and raised in SF person – vs. a transplant – 26th street doesn’t go anywhere NEAR downtown – it’s way down on the south side/edge. Barely in the city limits.

  12. l3wis on July 7, 2013 at 7:34 pm said:

    Yeah, it is only a mile away . . . (if you take Phillips from 26th to 14th.)

  13. Craig on July 10, 2013 at 9:17 am said:

    I’m the first to agree we won’t be cutting through the golf courses anytime soon. The only way this would ever happen would be if one of them opted to close and/or relocate and the other course agreed to renovate to add some holes while working around the new roadway/bridge. That isn’t very likely considering both clubs are in fantastic financial condition and Minnehaha is talking about a multi-million dollar renovation to their clubhouse.

    The city will never use any type of eminent domain to seize the land and they won’t even try to suggest the idea for several reasons.

    Number one, any mayor we have had in the past and will have in the future, and several of the future city councilors are likely members of at least one of those clubs at any given time. For those that aren’t members, they are friends, family or associates of someone who is.

    In short – people at those clubs are well connected. So well connected that nobody would dare try to cross them.

    Number two, it would be a political disaster. Think of how loud the SON group is screaming about a Walmart at 85th. Now take that amount of complaining and add to it pockets as deep as Jack Handey’s thoughts, at least three dozen law offices which have memberships to those clubs, members who are friends with not only city, but county, state, and federal officials including Senators, and you will get a grasp of how high a hurdle this might be.

    Plus even once you did get the road/bridge built – what would it help? As soon as you hit Kiwanis you are back to a two lane road that was never designed to handle the amount of traffic that would suddenly be funneled that direction.

    We would have a better chance of digging a tunnel from I29 to I229 with one access point somewhere near Minnesota Ave than we would in building a road across the country clubs, and after you figure in the legal fight from the clubs… a tunnel may end up being cheaper.

    It was a dumb idea when Hanson talked about it and it is a dumb idea now. I wish people would start thinking about other ways to improve traffic flows rather than continually beating this horse which died sometime during the Nixon administration.

  14. l3wis on July 10, 2013 at 6:51 pm said:

    “considering both clubs are in fantastic financial condition”

    Yeah, it took the HO several years to figure out someone was embezzeling from them 🙂

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