Update: Drinking Liberally touched on the race today in their weekly email, good stuff (and this is coming from a liberal Democrat);
In Politics: Locally: Theresa Stehly, much to the chagrin of the Mayor and his rubber stamp of five City Councilors, announced she would seek reelection to the City Council. Someone reportedly said, “Yes, she was right that the new $25 million dollar City Hall was built prematurely. And, yes, she was correct that the city shouldn’t have built the $21 million dollar parking ramp for Journey Construction’s phantom hotel and retail development downtown before a contract and a performance bond was properly in place. And, yes, she was right about many other things, but geez, she is such a pain in the ‘ass’. You know how those piano teachers are, always so precise, insisting that you hit the right note. Hell, the city has a half a Billion dollar budget, what is $10 million here and $10 million there. Let the City Council do its job in peace.”
While I question that sentiment, luckily for the-powers-that-be, Alex Jensen, a banker at Denny Sanford’s Premier Bank, has announced he will run for Teresa’s Council seat and has already raised $70,000.00 in his effort. As someone noted, “If they can buy this election, they are going to buy it. They may have to erect another statue or two to Denny Sanford, but they plan on getting the money they need.” To the-powers-that-be, it is important to eliminate the light Theresa shines on the business of the City.”
Some people call it corruption, others consider it business as usual. To the people supporting Alex Jensen, they want government the way it should be, with them in control, unquestioningly.
I chuckled at the Piano teacher reference. I joked with Theresa a few weeks ago when we were discussing her decision to run, “I find it funny that people would call a middle-aged, single, female, self-employed piano teacher a bully and a meanie, and probably a lot of other colorful words behind the scenes. They are mad, they are mad that someone with that profile dares to speak out on behalf of the citizenry.”
Sneveliscious over at the part-time daily wrote a good article about the Stehly vs. Jensen matchup.
The one the thing that is clearly missing from the article is Count Jensen’s lack of policy stances;
Jensen has the money and support of the chamber types, the who’s-who of the South Dakota GOP and even some sitting councilors he hopes to begin working with this spring.
Unlike most races where the incumbent has the upper hand, it’s the challenger that’s raised an unprecedented amount of money and is seen as the darling of the Sioux Falls establishment.
Stehly’s the incumbent. But Jensen has a nine-month head start on her in the campaign, jumping in the race last May and already raising more than $70,000.
Still, money isn’t everything in an election.
The only thing we really know about Jensen is that he raised a bunch of money. But in a single sentence, we have all we need to know about Stehly;
Stehly has built a legion of allies through the countless battles she’s waged with City Hall in the last four years over zoning disputes between homeowners and developers, neighborhoods who needed help rallying against the apartment planned next door, the road closure up the street, or concerns over sewer and water rate increases, pool closures and snow gates.
And much, much, more. It is going to be very entertaining watching these two answer questions at a candidate forum. Stehly will mop the floor.
Am anxious for the first debate. Just how much money is this Mayor pushing in Jensen’s direction?
This race is about only one issue: Are you pro-Bunker Ramp, or not?
$70k for a council seat. That’s about 3 times the annual compensation. It’s no wonder other council seats go unchallenged. Trump and Bloomberg own us nationally. Is it Sanford, Lloyd, and Bender regionally? Looks like democracy got replaced with kleptocracy.
The ‘rumor’ going around Steve is that Alex will probably have NORTH of $200K. I have heard that from a couple of loose lips on the Jensen side. Alex should ask how that worked out for Jim Entemen when he ran for mayor 🙂
I will vote for Theresa , do not always agree but a fighter for the little guy and she is not a yes vote like the rest of the councilors who just fall in line. Go Theresa
jensen’s policy stance is whatever matt paulson tells him it is.
A couple of things are quite misleading in the email from Drinking Liberally.
First, the email makes it seem like the parking ramp/hotel development were the idea of Ten Haken. It was not. In fact he rightfully cancelled the contract with the developers because they failed uphold their end of the bargain. Smart move. Theresa was not and is not the only one who has issues with it. Ten Haken was not in office when the deal was inked.
Second, it wasn’t Journey’s project. Sure they were the builders, but it wasn’t their failure. It was Legacys.
I do dare say that folks from drinking liberally are daydreamers. I’ve met them. They’re woefully illogical. The depth of their cleverness ends with the name of their club.
“Ten Haken was not in office when the deal was inked…”
That’s right, but he continued the deal when he replaced Legacy with Lamont. Then, he held a press conference promoting the talents and capabilities of Lamont and suggested that his own COS, Beck, had expertise in this field, too. At that moment, or press conference, ThuneHaken owned the Bunker Ramp debacle and from then on. Any mayor who is a straight shooter should have been bothered from day one about Legacy’s involvement and the cloud of questioning of the overall project, which comes with such an involvement.
Ten Haken could have stopped the project before it was started.
He did not.