South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

1st Amendment

1st Amendment Sioux Falls US Constitution

City attorney David Fiddle-Faddle proposing some interesting changes to the ethics board procedures

l3wis 19Comments

I found some of his proposals to be very interesting, especially in this section;

FIRST PARAGRAPH: What confidentiality rules? A private citizen is protected by the US Constitution and the 1st Amendment. They don’t have to keep ANYTHING confidential. If I file a complaint against an elected official for a certain reason, I can tell anyone I want to about the complaint. City charter and ordinance does not trump the US Constitution. Sorry Fiddle-Faddle, you are not fooling anyone with this proposal.

SECOND PARAGRAPH: The word frivolous means all kinds of things to all kinds of people, as defined in the dictionary;

1. characterized by lack of seriousness or sense: frivolousconduct.

2. self-indulgently carefree; unconcerned about or lacking anyserious purpose.

3. (of a person) given to trifling or undue levity: a frivolous,empty-headed person.

4. of little or no weight, worth, or importance; not worthy of serious notice: a frivolous suggestion.

What may be important to you, may not be important to me. This proposal is just an out for the ethics board to throw out complaints they don’t want to deal with. I can see why Fiddle-Faddle was unemployed when he came crawling to the city for a job.
ENTIRE PROPOSED CHANGES; ethicchanges
1st Amendment Media Sioux Falls

Don’t worry, I will still let you be Anon-Chickenshits on my site (H/T – AG)

l3wis 24Comments

I know most of you, so I do a pretty good job of filtering out the psychos – sometimes. But this can’t be good news for ANON commenters on the Argue Endorser’s website;

Gannett this month will begin a groupwide initiative requiring readers to become Facebook members before they are allowed to submit online comments. The move covers all of Gannett’s U.S. newspaper and broadcast sites as well as USA Today. The publisher tested swapping commenting management from Pluck to Facebook at four newspaper sites before making the switch. A memo issued by the publisher said it will continue to use Pluck’s software for other website functions, at least for the short-term. Gannett follows a growing group of newspaper publishers that have opted to use Facebook as a conduit through which readers can post comments. Among them, The Orange County (Calif.) Register, MediaNews Group, Tribune Co., Media General and The San Diego Union-Tribune.

STORMLAND TV already does this on their site. I like it. Wanna say something? Back it up. I also believe you can delete your own comments, if you misspoke 🙂

I totally busted a city snowplow operator bitching about snow gates on the KELO site, and he deleted the comments. I guess losing all of that overtime got him worried.

1st Amendment SF City Council Sioux Falls

The Final Countdown

l3wis 6Comments

Not sure if anyone watched the City Council meeting Monday night, but now they have a countdown clock that will play on the overhead screen during public testimony.

Silly.

First off, I don’t have a problem with the 5 minute rule, but it should be given some latitude. During the Pawn Shop ordinance testimony, local attorney, Dean Nasser,  asked for more time since he was representing several clients. Seems reasonable.

But to be quite honest with you, the anti-censorship, 1st Amendment rights freak in me says, to Hell with the time limit. We elect and pay these people to serve us. They must listen, no matter how painful it may be for them. With or without our hats on.

1st Amendment Open Government Open Meetings Rapid City

And you thought SF’s city government lacked transparency

l3wis 3Comments

Apparently, Rapid City has everyone in the state whipped;

Although many of the incumbents in next month’s mayor and city council races pledge they are proponents of open, transparent government, they operate the most closed-door city council sessions in South Dakota.

In 2010, councilors voted to shield their discussion from public view at 20 of the 23 regularly scheduled council meetings. They spent more than 18 hours discussing city issues they deemed sensitive enough for private discussion. That is nearly 20 percent of the 98 hours the body met in total, according to an analysis by the Rapid City Journal.

And compare that to Sioux Falls;

However, records indicate that Sioux Falls — which is more than twice as populous as Rapid City — entered closed sessions at only nine of its 43 meetings in 2010. That accounted for less than six hours, or 10 percent of the total meeting time. Sioux Falls City Attorney Dave Pfeifle said they only use the sessions for brief updates on litigation and other important discussions.

The litigation part I understand, but what does ‘important discussion’ mean? Personnel and Litigation matters – fine. Anything else should be wide open. Hasn’t RC learned something from the sanitation debacle? Maybe they have; MORE SECRECY.

 

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