There has been a little chatter after the council decided to put it on the November ballot last night;

Voters will decide the outcome of Huether’s $115 million events center plan Nov. 8 after the City Council voted 7-1 to call a special election. The project has been one of Huether’s top priorities.

So will there be an official opposition group? One wonders. Holsen and Hildebrand seem to be against the EC as planned at the Arena site.

The Mayor’s campaign ad and his presentations to the City Council and his comments to the press are declarations of what he will do regarding this project. Call it what you will. But the fact is that his words are just that – promises to do something.

Many have thrown the idea out there, including myself, that the BID people and the ‘Staggers Brigade’ need to join forces to fight this poor plan. I hope some kind of opposition group forms, I would hate to see the mayor steamroll this project over the next 3 months with mis-information, lies and shady math.

I’m game, anybody else?

6 Thoughts on “Will there be an opposition group to the Events Center?

  1. I bet you could get bunch of city employees to join opposition. No money for raises cuz we are strapped but plenty of money for events center cuz were filty rich and rolling in dough. Which is it?

  2. I watched Jonathan Ellis and Patrick Lalley on 100 Eyes on South Dakota Politics yesterday. One of them mentioned that ‘Build It Now’ has amassed $400,000 that they intend to use to push for the new EC.

    Talk about overkill…..

    If there is that much private money out there to run a “political campaign” (as Mike Sullivan, the head of ‘Build It Now’ and the Sports Authority refers to their effort), then where are all the private donors that Mike has promised would back this???

    They all seem to be in hiding!!!!!!!!!!

    I doubt that spending $400,000 is going to impress the undecided voters that have become such high stakes…………

  3. Dick – It is just too bad that not all city employees are SF residents. I think it is around 700 are registered SF voters.

    CR – I think ANY opposition group should just wait in the weeds, and take notes for 2 months and 3 weeks and hammer all the misconceptions the last week before the vote. Huether pulled off the mayoral election that way.

  4. I know that Kermit WILL NOT be a part of any opposition group.

  5. Randall on August 11, 2011 at 10:48 am said:

    I wonder if there’s any way to contract it so that ANY and EVERY $ over $115M has to come right out of Mayor Huether’s own pocket?

    Do you think that would make our politicos a little more careful (honest) when they throw out these figures for their special projects?

  6. Randall – Interesting you bring that up. There was discussion when Munson approved a 100% cost overrun on Phillips to the Falls (in the middle of the night w/o council approval) That if the chickenshit council, at the time, would have filed charges against him for breaking city ordinance, that he could be personally responsible for the cost overrun. Not sure if city ordinance can force that or not?

    Poly, look into it.

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