October 2017

Administration’s Presentation on siding settlement ironically full of holes

You can watch the replay and read the presentation HERE. (FF to Aprox 29:00)

I won’t go into a lot of detail since it was a very long meeting, but there was something NEW that came from the discussion.

The city attorney said that due to state statute they don’t HAVE to release the forensic report about the siding, BUT they can as pointed out by councilor Starr. The administration refuses to release the report and told the council to take Public Works Director Mark Cotter’s word for it that it is structurally sound.

When councilor Neitzert asked about the ‘corroding edges’ email in the below invoice for the report work, NO ONE from the administration would comment on what that meant.

This worries me.

There may be a followup meeting to digest all that was said today. I think moving forward the council should use some of the money leftover in the building fund (around $3 million) to conduct their own independent study on the structural integrity of the siding and put this to rest once and for all.

City Attorney jumping the Huether Ship

It is no surprise to me that City Attorney David Pfeifle will take a position
with the South Dakota Public Assurance Alliance. It’s just unfortunate that he will still be schlemping off the taxpayers in his new position. I was hoping he would return to private practice, but maybe he could not hack it in the real world.

I had a weird feeling over the weekend that David would be the next to resign from the Huether administration. I figured once he went on personal leave, we probably wouldn’t see him again, or very little;

Sioux Falls, South Dakota: City Attorney David Pfeifle will become the executive director of the South Dakota Public Assurance Alliance effective November 6, 2017, after seven and a half years serving the City of Sioux Falls and a 23-year career practicing law. His final day with the City of Sioux Falls will be October 31.

I ultimately expect Turbak and Cooper to be next, I don’t expect to many skippers left on the SS Huether come next May. I think Cooper will just retire.

“David has always kept Sioux Falls top of mind and has served all of us so admirably over the years. We would not have been able to navigate some challenging waters, ultimately getting things accomplished for our city, without the wisdom and determination of David Pfeifle. I wish him and his family nothing but the best!” says Mayor Mike Huether.

Pfeifle started with the City of Sioux Falls on July 19, 2010. During his years as the City Attorney, Pfeifle says his greatest accomplishment is assembling a great legal team working on behalf of the people of Sioux Falls, and who will carry the department forward.

Hardy, Harr, Harr. David was famous for hiring outside counsel anytime a ‘challenging’ project came up. So I guess he was smart enough to know when he wasn’t smart enough to know.

When the city got slapped with an open meetings violation while terminating Debra Owen, David had to defend the city’s (his) decision in front of the Open Meetings Commission. I remember sitting in the cramped room listening to people audibly laughing out loud at David’s arguments.

He lost, BTW. In fact David has lost many big cases for the city, even with the help of outside counsel. I would be curious of how much the city has paid out in settlement money since he has been city attorney. Which of course brings us to the convoluted siding settlement.

UPDATE: It is rumored that when the administrative team does their presentation today at the city council informational about the siding settlement, they may refuse to take questions. We will see how the council handles this.

He certainly won’t be missed, it’s just unfortunate we still have to help pay his salary working for an organization that blames ‘GOD’ whenever they don’t want to pay out a claim to the citizens they abuse.

Should the siding settlement be reviewed by the AG or the Feds?

More came out today that the secret siding settlement may not be adding up;

The document shows, in essence, the city moved money from one fund to another and claimed it as new money when it announced the settlement.

I know, my head continues to spin more and more as we dig further in the weeds on this settlement. If the city really was moving funds around to present an appearance of a rebate to taxpayers, was it a criminal act? I’m not sure. But it is starting to look like more and more law enforcement should be involved at this point.

I have already encouraged some councilors in private that the one thing that seems cut and dry on this deal is that we were lied to on multiple levels, and that is grounds enough to have the council publicly censure the mayor and some of his department heads. If I was on the council, I would also ask for the mayor’s resignation. While the home rule charter gives the executive branch many unlimited powers, I don’t think lying is one of them.

But since ethics in this state and city don’t seem to be fireable offenses, maybe an outside investigation should be done. I think we have learned enough from EB-5 and Gear Up that secret backdoor deals have dreadful results that usually leaves taxpayers holding the bag.

So how far will the council, the media and citizens let this go before asking for an investigation? Not sure, but if they do, they should do it soon.

BIZZO Week for Sioux Falls City Government

It all gets started for me tonight as I got accepted to Citizen Planning Academy, it’s a two-part class about city planning. About 30 citizens & development professionals are signed up. Should be fun.

Sioux Falls City Council Informational Meeting, 4 PM, Tuesday

As I have mentioned earlier, the administration’s EC team will be answering questions about the siding settlement. This should be an interesting Q & A. I also wonder if the EC’s primary building inspector, and now a former city employee, the project manager will make an appearance?

Sioux Falls City Council Regular Meeting, 7 PM, Tuesday

The council meeting itself is pretty sleepy.

In item#1, consent agenda, the parking ramp negotiations continue to drag on, so much they had to pay outside counsel another $30K. Please council, KILL THIS NOW before it costs us anymore!

Sioux Falls Charter Revision Commission, 4 PM, Wednesday

This will be their first meeting before the Spring municipal election. They will basically just set their meeting calendar at this meeting. It will be interesting to see if they address the conflict of interest that one of the members of the CRC is the wife of a mayoral candidate and whether or not it is appropriate she serves.

Sioux Falls Planning Commission, 6 PM, Wednesday

Item#6, ZONE the Railroad Yards. I don’t call this the RR relocation project, because nothing is getting relocated accept the switchyard. Two tracks will still remain that will run more frequent. Taxpayers will even have to pay for a fence beside the two remaining tracks.

Rezone map also looks peculiar, notice that not all of the surrounding land is getting zoned.

This was an incredible waste of $27 million in Federal money. Just imagine all of the things we could have re-developed DT for that same amount, AND moved the RR tracks permanently out of the area. Huether likes to think of this as one of his greatest achievements as our mayor, but it was actually one of the most wasteful Federal pork projects ever done in our city.