Not only are taxpayers subsidizing the landscaping and spray park along the river for a privately developed hotel the developers got a TIF to boot. And who approved this project before it went on to the city council? The parks board of course in which the wife and co-owner of the development company building the hotel belongs as a board member.
But hey, there is no conflicts of interest here, move along, nothing to see.
Need Cash from the city? If you are developer in SF, you may be able to get drive up service at city hall.
A South DaCola foot soldier attended the city council working session yesterday, and was surprised to hear the city was considering ‘cash incentives’ besides TIF’s to developers. What a slippery slope! They told me this about the meeting;
The room was packed with developers (invited by Darrin Smith). I sat next to a developer and a prominent city director. The developer kept making the remark ad naseum that he came to the meeting because he heard that they were handing out free money! He was giddy! After he had said the same thing over and over, the city director that was sitting next to him said,
“Yeah, maybe we should just have a drive-up?”
I already think it is a farce we give TIF’s to developers to re-develop older neighborhoods when we don’t give it to residents who buy older homes and fix them up (though community development does a nice job with low-interest equity loans and grants). But I draw the line at cash incentives. How does a tax payer benefit from giving a direct payment to a private business without receiving a service? We don’t.
And secondly, how dare a city director joke about it.
The Gargoyle Leader’s editorial board never ceases to astonish me. Today they wrote an editorial reminding citizens who should set policy in Sioux Falls;
More importantly, though, city leaders – not local developers – need to be driving policy decisions on whether to adjust the hookup fees.
No shit sherlock. This editorial should have been written seven years ago. Citizens elect the council and mayor to vote for their best interests, but it seems this current council and mayor do the bidding of the big developers, time and time again.
This sign has been sitting along Phillips to the Falls for quite awhile. While advertising property for lease is perfectly legal I question whether these developers and realtors can advertise property THEY DO NOT OWN. I’m sure they worked out some deal with the city (The city owns the property), but I still think it is bologna that they can advertise land THAT WE AS TAXPAYERS OWN. Wanna lease the property? Then buy it already and put it on the taxrolls. It would be like me running a classified in the paper for a car I have for sale, but I don’t own it. Then once I find a buyer, I go buy the car and resell it. Since when are taxpayer’s a bank? It seems in this town that’s how it works.
Who wouldn’t want to live here?
As the recession goes into full swing Sioux Falls will probably see an influx of outsiders coming here looking for jobs because of a still considerably low unemployment rate – BUT reports like this only encourage that influx. Is growth a bad thing? No way, we don’t want to end up like Sioux City, but I always tell people our model of growth represents Walmart more then it does Costco. A few years ago I read an article comparing the two big box stores and what a world of difference. Walmart grew fast, had a 50% turnaround a year and their average employee made $19,000 a year. Costco had slow, calculated growth, had a 1% turnaround a year and it’s average employee made $40,000 a year. I’m afraid Sioux Falls is turning into a Walmart;
Sioux Falls is among the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in the nation and one of only two metro areas in the Midwest to make the top 50, according to a report being released today by the U.S. Census Bureau.
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From July 1, 2007, to July 1, 2008, the metro area grew by almost 6,000, to an estimated population of 232,930 people. The metro area includes Minnehaha, Lincoln, Turner and McCook counties.
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The area ranked 19th in the nation for rapid population gains, with a growth rate of 2.6 percent. It ranked 36th the previous year.
This fast growth concerns me especially when we are over $80 million behind on infrastructure, almost $300 million in bond debt and several neighborhoods in the central part of the city are falling apart (not just Pettigrew Heights). But of course, Munson paints a rosy picture;
Sioux Falls Mayor Dave Munson said the area has much to offer: low crime, low cost of living and low taxation.
This statement is misleading. Transportation and food costs are actually higher in South Dakota and cost of living is comparable to Omaha and Kansas City. As for low taxation, this is true, for upper middle class and the wealthy because of regressive taxes on food and utilities which hurt the working class, the majority of people in our city.
Sioux Falls has been fortunate because the growth has been steady and stable, making it easier to plan and keep up with the challenges.
It has been steady, but like I said above, I question how stable when you are not keeping up with infrastructure you risk splitting the town into different sectors of the haves and have nots. At the council meeting on Monday I noticed that the zoning commission and council approved a 433 residential single family lot development. I didn’t catch the area, but I can guarantee some corn field is getting dug up to build more crackerjack box houses. The next mayor and council need to to take a 40/60 approach to developement and growth over the next four years. Budgeting and focusing 60% of funds into infrastructure and neighborhood rehabilitation and 40% on new growth so we can catch up and still not jeapordize new growth.
“We can get out ahead of development and make sure we have the infrastructure in place,” he said.
But we don’t and that’s why I am concerned.