January 2012

Music

RIP Etta James

l3wis January 20, 2012 4Comments

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3KT5P24O79I[/youtube]

Secretary of State

Is SOS Gant setting a dangerous precedent?

l3wis January 20, 2012 5Comments

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iX4aeCZWhTY[/youtube]

I get a little nervous when Beavis and Butthead (Powers and Gant) cook up new ideas;

Gant had said that board members would be able to review proposed bills at the Nov. 29 meeting but changed his mind.

In a compromise, Gant emailed the seven bills to board members Tuesday evening, when they were notified of the Thursday meeting.

Gee, Jason, thanks for the head’s up. It seems with your technology master, Powers, you would have been able to figure out how to email the board your change suggestions well in advance. Guess not. Must have something to hide.

Gant’s style is a departure from the way his predecessor, Chris Nelson, handled proposed legislation with the board.

Nelson presented the bills in the fall and asked for input and the board’s blessing.

â€œI don’t know whether that was something Chris Nelson did because he wanted some additional input or wanted us involved, or it was something that we were required to do,â€ said board member Chris Madsen on Wednesday.

Exactly, why even have a board if King Gant is going to do whatever he wants to. Heh, Heh, you said Gant.

Event Center Sioux Falls

Will brokerage firms issue bonds for the Events Center w/o an appeals process?

l3wis January 19, 2012 6Comments

I’m posting this just out of curiosity, I don’t know the answer, nor do I think I am anywhere near being an expert on city code, but someone pointed this out to me today in reference to the Dan Daily case and the SD Supreme Court ruling;

â€¢ Code 2-66 prevents appeals, Defendant or City.

â€¢ The city can request compliance but have no way to enforce it.

â€¢ The city must allow appeals before they can broker events center bonds.

â€¢ Brokerages likely will not sponsor bonds unless they have legal recourse in case of default.

Like I said, don’t know if this is true. But it will be interesting to see the negotiations when those bonds become available.

SF City Council Sioux Falls

UPDATED: SF City Council walked-in items on website now, sorta.

l3wis January 19, 2012 8Comments

As you can see the items are up, but they still lack a PDF on item #22.

(Click on image to see larger)

Look closely at Section 15 of Item 21 and the proppsed changes;Â campaign

Notice they changed it so current office holders (incumbents running for re-election included) cannot be investigated, but if you are Joe Blow running for office, people can file all kinds of complaints about you and how you are running your campaign.

The other day on the Argue Endorser’s ‘100’ Eyes show, managing editor, Patrick Lalley contended it just takes HARD WORK and A GOOD STRATEGY to win a council seat. Hogwash. While these are important factors, it also takes money and connections. It is an uphill battle for any average Joe to run for council in this city, and ordinances like this don’t help, they only make it harder for NON-incumbents to run.

I’ll put a challenge out there to Joe Kirby, (who thinks I need a vacation-thanks for noticing) if he thinks that regular people should run for city council, I suggest he starts a PAC that helps them with the financial end of it. He could call it ‘The Average JOE PAC’ and if candidates present him with a good strategy he could help fund their campaigns. The Jim Entenman’s of the world don’t need more donations from the Joe Kirby’s of the world.

Ellis also points out on his blog that open meetings laws may have been broken by walking in and voting on these items, if so, tsk-tsk, but what bothers me even more is that the items (PDF Documents) are still not listed on the city website. WTF? I know they are available, because city clerk Roust pulled them up during the meeting, so why are they not listed.

Sketchy. To say the least.

Sioux Falls Urban Agriculture