Yes, the details still need to be ironed out until the ordinance becomes in effect on June 19, but doesn’t it seem odd that NO ONE from any of our TV stations has said a word about it? Just this morning KSFY and KDLT did identical stories about a rib booth at Ribfest, in fact the vendor used the exact same script for both interviews. It should not come as any surprise, the media has done zero coverage of things like the Tuthill ghost (SFPD refuses to give the public clues like the audio of the officer) so this case will probably go unsolved. Or how for over eight months there has been NO update on whether the Event Center siding will be fixed, which could end up costing taxpayers millions or left with a crap siding job.

Someone said to me that maybe there isn’t enough interest in the story. Are you kidding? Every parent I have told this to of young children is excited about it, they like the idea of the buses having bike racks and that ALL kids can ride regardless of the economic stature.

So while they are copying each others stories about a dry rub from Minnesota, maybe they can do a real story about what is going on in our community. But that would require them to actually call councilors and do interviews.

15 Thoughts on “Sioux Falls TV media’s silence over free bus rides for youth

  1. The Daily Spin on May 28, 2015 at 2:45 pm said:

    Haven’t seen a reporter outside the studio cubicle farm lately. Have you? If they’re not part of the community, it’s time for cable networks to produce local news and Web pages.

  2. anonymous on May 28, 2015 at 3:18 pm said:

    Does MMM have this much influence over the local media?

    FYI The buses are set up to carry a maximum of two bikes at a time.

  3. Greg Neitzert on May 28, 2015 at 4:49 pm said:

    The local mainstream media is so intellectually lazy – its mystifying and disappointing. Who needs the weather forecast repeated 3 times in a half hour news program? Simply regurgitating the city press releases isn’t enough. Where is the investigative journalism? How about asking some tough questions? Any of us who pay attention to city politics can come up with a number of story ideas. I understand these are hard news outlets and they can’t just go speculate, so go out and ask some simple questions, start the discussion and debate.
    This is why blogs like this and public input are so vital. Without alternative outlets and venues, we’d have nothing but softball stories and weather forecasts.

  4. duggersd on May 28, 2015 at 7:40 pm said:

    TANSTAAFL
    There are no “free” bus rides. There are bus rides that are being paid for by citizens of the city of Sioux Falls. I remember when the pools were “free”. If you advocate this, fine. but at least be willing to be accurate in the characterization.

  5. Titleist on May 28, 2015 at 10:24 pm said:

    Public pools should be free. And yes there is a cost to the public associated with that.

  6. l3wis on May 28, 2015 at 10:34 pm said:

    Titleast! We actually agree on something! Call the, uh …

  7. The Daily Spin on May 29, 2015 at 9:56 am said:

    Local weather 3 times an hour, get it as needed real time all the time from your phone. Geographically specific and better. Paint the KELO doppler domes yellow with red bites. New function, PacMan for section roads.

  8. The Daily Spin on May 29, 2015 at 9:59 am said:

    Has broadcast TV, like newspapers, become obsolete?

  9. Ol'Bubbleguts on May 29, 2015 at 10:15 am said:

    Corn and Soybean barons like to know weather.
    Thats why its on.

    OBG,..IAaL and that ain’t all

    2days have not cooked or eaten out of the FRIDGE
    *what briquettes ahr fo”

    butterflying a pork loin stuffed with gahlic onion and peppers smoking for 4 hours under 200.
    Brats and other crap too.
    Thunderstrorms rainey.
    I said something here that has come back to bite me on ASS bigtime
    Found out my house will have a flooded
    basement from giant lutheran Church parking lot that turns my property into a Lake.3 inches in an hour and a half News flew by me but Texas got 12 inches<rain mind yourself fool/ touched me rivers where not sposed to be Whut?

  10. hornguy on May 29, 2015 at 2:51 pm said:

    To Greg in comment #3: There’s a reason the content and format for all local news is effectively the same: it’s what their ratings and focus groups tell them to do. Your issue isn’t with the media – your issue is with your neighbors. The people who are intellectually lazy are the people in your community. Your media outlets are just giving the masses what they say they want: weather up front, more weather later, some community interest fluff thrown in the middle, maybe some high school sports. Investigative journalism is hard and time consuming and costs money, and nobody wants to pay for it.

    To comment #4: Yes, there are free bus rides. Purely from an economic standpoint, the cost of accepting passengers on a route that’s already running and for which capacity presently exists is nearly zero, unless you want to get into the fuel cost of transporting a 12-year-old’s weight. Those free bus rides only cost money at the point that those kids are displacing paid passengers or causing paid passengers to use other forms of transportation. And if you’ve ever seen a SAM bus trolling around town, it’s going to take a whole lot of kids to displace anyone.

    It’s not like a “kids eat free” buffet in which the cost of the food consumed is typically passed on to other customers in the form of higher prices, or your example of a public pool, in which increased use might necessitate employing additional lifeguards. If ten kids get on the bus SAM doesn’t need to hire an extra driver.

  11. Be part of the solution on May 29, 2015 at 4:28 pm said:

    Greg,
    Right on! I am so sick of hearing bogus weather forecasts repeated over and over for the news. Sioux Falls is not that boring, come on News outlets you can be better than reporting weather! If I want to know the weather I go to weather.gov. I want NEWS reported to me in my community!

  12. l3wis on May 29, 2015 at 5:43 pm said:

    This is actually getting more interesting by the day. I guess the mayor won’t sign the resolution, and to make things more tricky, SAM (Sioux Area Metro) is in contract negotiations with the city right now.

  13. Joan on May 29, 2015 at 6:10 pm said:

    From what I know, unless it has changed in the last few years SAM is actually operated by a company from another state(something like the ambulance service). The last I heard the company operating SAM was supposed to be from Canada.

  14. duggersd on May 30, 2015 at 6:21 am said:

    Hornguy, cannot agree with you on this one. Yes, the bus is there anyway. But the bus does not run for free. There are costs associated with it. Those costs are probably not paid for by the riders. They are subsidized by the citizens of the city. As a city, we have decided it is worth the costs. Adding youngsters does not really increase the costs, but when a kid gets on the bus, he is using something that has costs associated with it. I am not saying we should or should not be doing this. I am only saying it ain’t free.

  15. Poly43 on May 30, 2015 at 8:08 am said:

    And our peoples mayor will not sign the resolution because?????

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