In Paul’s latest fiddling with his extreme hatred for transparency, he changed an executive order which basically shortens up the time the public knows about an ordinance change, YET requires the council to give more advance notice to city directors about their intentions.
Once again Paul is nosing around in the legislative branch and telling them how they will legislate. While I’m okay with giving the city directors more time to mull over changes, we should also be extending the time citizens know about an issue.
I also think that this should be a decision made by the city council, NOT by executive order.
The city council doesn’t work for city directors and the mayor, they work for the citizens, this is why we elect them. But it has been evident, almost since the Home Rule Charter was founded that the city council does the bidding of the mayor and directors and has never turned down an opportunity to put more rules, more fees and more taxes on the citizens. I implore anyone who can show me when the city council has deregulated/eliminated ordinances or cut taxes and fees since this form of government was implemented in the 90’s. If you can, I’ll buy you a beer (or two).
This is the problem with the form of government we have now in Sioux Falls. It is setup so the directors form policy while the RS6 approves those policies that benefit the banksters and developers in town, while more regulations and taxes get levied on the rest of us.
This ‘little change’ is just another way of hiding city business from the citizens. And what it really is about is a deep hatred for sunshine and openness in our local government, and like covid, it will be hard to cure this deep sickness at city hall.
The charter is oligarchy. Citizens have a king but not a mayor. This we know. It’s really only a matter of when to revolt or move. New taxes and rights infraction has not affected enough people thus far. We could return to democracy with a vote provided polling places aren’t hidden, independents aren’t prevented from voting, and ballots aren’t taken home overnight. Citizens are excluded from government. It’s likely this won’t change any time soon.
the mayor is sneaking around with a mask because he doesn’t want to get his lungs wrecked by the virus his Governor tells him doesn’t exist.
The only time I can remember the City Council voting to lower any tax rate was during Mayor Dave Munson’s administration – in fact it was perhaps the only time, while the tax was again raised once he left office.
My example – the 2nd Penny Sales Tax was lowered by $0.08 cents making the city sales tax 1.92% which was implimented I want to say in the year 2004 or 2005; I know this cause as a business owner, I am required to collect it. Roughly around the time Mike Huether came to office in 2010 – the City Council then voted to raise the “tax” back to an even 2.00% claiming they needed the additional funds necessary to finance Capital Receipts.
Did the 0.08 cents increase make a huge difference? Well upon analyzing the past sales tax numbers, I say NO; as the Population has grown rapidly by roughkly 3,500 residents per year since, which automatically raises the total amount of the tax collected. Remember – I brought this up in front of the Council in December 2019 (my first ever public comments); the night I presented evidence of the list of ‘taxes’ paid by the residents of Sioux Falls.
The Sales Tax has increased every year since. So I made the argument we could very effectivly trim the 2nd Penny Tax back to 1.75% and still be fine. That is actually a drop of 12% in collected tax. Which by the population #’s does not even hurt us one bit.
Problem – This City Council has tied the 2nd Penny to our growing “Debt” for years to come, and they need it as collateral damage.
– Mike Zitterich
zitterich76@gmail.com
Strong-mayor sucks, but what do you expect when an ironman is elected.
You want a weak-mayor? Make him handle an emergency without a trucker hat.
You want a former mayor? Tell him to keep forgoing the snow plowing.
You want to run a mayor out of town, former or not? Tell him to defund the municipal band with a pocket veto.