UPDATE II: Mayor TenHaken will be playing ‘Chicken Little’ today at a presser

UPDATE II: I found some interesting quotes from the mayor and councilor Sigette. It is obvious they don’t believe in transparency so they are struggling with the rollout;

TenHaken told Sioux Falls Simplified that the cuts are strategically aimed at impacting the average citizen. He said if he just “lays off people behind the scenes,” no one will notice, and it won’t mean anything. But if someone who’s used to going to the story hour at the library at 9 a.m. doesn’t get to do that anymore, they’ll notice and ultimately call the mayor to complain.

First off, a municipal government can’t just lay off people behind the scenes (that may be illegal). You CAN and SHOULD tell constituents about the layoffs. I think most people would support a handful of overpaid middle managers being laid off opposed to cutting services. It only makes sense. But not to this guy who is worried a handful of city employees will be mad at him. I am hoping the city council has the courage to make the cuts to salaries (the council doesn’t have to instruct the admin to lay off anyone, but what they can do is force his hand by cutting the salary budget by $3 MILLION a year, which would force the mayor to lay off managers.

Jennifer Sigette had this to say;

“I’m really curious to know what the public’s going to say,” Sigette said. “We tend to hear from some fo the same loud voices. I’m hoping, since these are things the broader community uses, we’ll start hearing from people who don’t necessarily typically reach out to councilors.”

The public won’t say anything because they won’t know because city government has no transparency, as for the ‘loud voices’ comment, I’ve calmed down a bit, so I will just be to the point. Those people who come each week are actually representing folks who either can’t make the meeting or are afraid to publicly speak. Tim represents the Whittier neighborhood and Sierra is the president of the Pettigrew Heights association, I have a blog that has 5-10K readers a day and get many emails from constituents. We are LOUD because we are speaking on behalf of others. You really don’t get it? Do you? This is what happens when you elect someone with ZERO percent of the vote.

UPDATE: So I came to the presser today a few minutes late, and the door to the media room was locked so I asked the security guard why it was locked and he told me it locks automatically, and did not assist me in getting in. I asked a reporter after the presser about it and they told me they always have it locked and you have to wiggle the handle and they will let you in. WTH? This is an open to the public presser, paranoid much? More closed government BS from the king of closed government.

As for the presser, very interesting. It was obvious the mayor was fed a bunch of this information and just repeated it. He even said that SF citizens should elect better legislators. I would agree, but with gerrymandering and moving district lines, it would be hard to get a near perfect representation, but when it comes to property taxes, they did the right thing.

The mayor also concluded that the City doesn’t have much leverage when it comes managing what can be collected for property taxes (state legislature). This is patently FALSE. The council approves a tax increase every year since I can remember and having the power to institute TIFs without the approval of the counties and school district is a massive property tax restructuring that only increases taxes on the rest of us. If you stopped further TIF’s, our taxes would go down without legislation.

Now, Paul is correct, property taxes fund operating costs, but funds CAN be moved around to different departments. There are also quite a few operating expenses we could eliminate that wouldn’t have an effect on service. Paul suggests we cut essential programming instead of other cost cutting measurements. If we stop funding all the non-profits in town unless they are directly contracted by the city to provide professional services (Like the Link) we could easily save millions. But, Megan from SF Simplified had an even better suggestion, she asked why employee cuts were not looked at? I told a recent mayoral candidate that I would terminate all non-union middle management, not only would the cost saving be great (wages, benefits, retirement) they are NOT needed. The candidate laughed at me, but I told them, ‘Really? You have a director who gives an order to a supervisor below them, usually the assistant director, and takes those orders to union management. Silly. There is NO reason the director can’t instruct lower management, there is NO need for a middle man.

GREAT QUESTION MEGAN!

I heard that TenHaken is having a presser this morning (even though I can’t find any media alerts on FB or on the City’s website). I know, shocker, with all the openness and transparency with this admin . . . never mind.

He is going to discuss the city ‘losing’ $26 million in revenue over the next decade due to property tax cuts. Him and his lapdog finance director have been pushing this BS narrative for a week.

First the obvious, you are not ‘losing’ revenue that was never owed to you. The tax formula changed. So that means you change your budget forecast modeling after the new tax code and budget accordingly (in other words make cuts to capital programs).

Secondly, there will be NO cuts to regular programming (Fire, police, public works, etc.) that’s a false flag they are promoting. Who will take the hit? Mostly capital programs. In other words we may miss out on some park expansion and rec trail expansion, but these cuts wouldn’t affect regular services and they know it.

Thirdly, it is incredibly disheartening to see a lame duck promote higher taxes instead of cuts.

Lastly, I have maintained in my 18 years of blogging that TAXES are for essential services and not play things and entertainment venues. We have over extended ourselves on play palaces.

My first suggestion would be to cut MOST capital programs that are NOT essential the next 5 years. You would be SHOCKED at the tax savings, I would suggest it would be a heckuva a lot more then $2.6 million a year.

Also, I find this resistance to tax cuts insulting. As constituents we have had to cut back on stuff since Covid, and the Trump economy is making it worse, as I predict a full on recession by the end of the year.

I’m sorry, but when I am struggling to maintain my household expenses, I could give two-sh!ts about a new parking lot at a tennis court.