UPDATE: City Employees ‘Play Dumb’ when they screw up

UPDATE: Isn’t it funny how these things work. Small business owner contacts the city council (only ONE responded, Stehly) and the Media and suddenly a meeting occurs this afternoon with the Building Services department, zoning and health department and there is NO problems with this food service.

Why do average small business owners have to cause a ruckus with the media and city councilors to be treated fairly?! Shouldn’t they be treated like everyone else? Nope. As I found out in the Planning Academy 2 years ago, it’s the people with the big bucks that get what they want and the little man be damned. Sad.

But I’m glad that it all worked out, and want to thank Councilor Stehly and Jodi Schwan for looking at this and helping out.

We have seen this several times throughout several departments, but building services usually is the culprit;

At the beginning of the year, the Rooneys checked in with city officials in the Health, Zoning and Building Services departments, knowing that theirs would be the first business using a shipping container as a walk-up shop. The couple told department staff members that the container would be moved in on a flatbed trailer, set in place and then picked up and moved into storage for the winter, Rooney said. They were told it would be considered a food truck, she said, so they bought a container from Mobile Mini Solutions, and a friend who’s a builder customized it for them.

They’re frustrated that they were given misinformation from the start, Rooney said.

“We feel like this sort of thing shouldn’t happen,” she said. “They should be clear. … We built it with the understanding it was going to be OK. If we had known at the time, we would have customized a food trailer.”

“The first thing we need is some plans submitted,” said Butch Warrington, the chief building official for the city. “We have never had a plan submitted.”

Warrington said he’s had conversations with the Rooneys, but the two sides can’t get to a starting point until the Rooneys submit a plan for the location.

He said he didn’t have any comment about the Rooneys’ issue with the information they said they received from city staff at the beginning of the year.

Because of their experience, the Rooneys plan to speak during the public comment section of Tuesday night’s City Council meeting, Rooney said.

“We want them to hear our experience with the city because this isn’t an OK thing. … This is hard on a small business. We have so many small businesses (in Sioux Falls), and that’s what great about us.”

That’s the first thing you have going against you ‘small business’. This city will make small business people jump through multiple hoops. There also seems to be a lot of mis-communication (or no communication) between Health, Licensing, the SFPD & FD and Building Services, you would think you could go to ONE department, like Building Services and they would be able to give you the green light and check-off? Nope, welcome to our network of beauracrats and runaround. Speaking of that, it is getting worse. Last year’s budget called for an additional 17 FTEs this year the number is rumored to be over 20 FTEs. I guess they need additional staff to cover for all the directors with no degrees or experience in their fields, but what do you expect from an administrator that is either on vacation or throwing pizza parties?