South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

Legacy Developments

Bunker Ramp Developers Development Downtown Sioux Falls Legacy Developments Mayor TenHaken Sioux Falls

TenHaken interview reveals his lack of leadership

l3wis 2Comments

The first thing he does in this interview is blame the last guy for the problems with the Bunker Ramp. While there is ‘some’ truth to that, he could have put the brakes on immediately after he took office, instead he took a piece of toilet paper signed by developers that said they were good for the money.

Then he says he doesn’t want to do an audit until after it is finished, while that is SOP, and I get it from a financial standpoint, there is NOTHING stopping him from looking into what went wrong RIGHT NOW. That doesn’t take an audit to achieve, it requires him doing his job as the city manager and city employees boss (his main job according to charter) and putting a boot up their butts or at least a stern talking to and get them on investigating what went wrong before we sign on the dotted line for another developer to finish it.

He once again fails to lead.

I really believe one of the reasons the deal fell through towards the end is because of the Sioux Steel development and potential for a TIF funded parking ramp.

This is pure speculation of course, but think about it for a moment, what if they would have allowed the Bunker Ramp Hotel to be ‘scaled back’ and finished? That means a nice hotel in the center of our downtown would have opened at least a year before the Sioux Steel Hotel and Convention Center. Things that make you go hmmmmmm. I won’t get into all the players involved, but something smells funny here.

Towards the end of the interview, PTH continues to blabber about charging non-profits for police assistance, China and Kermit.

Downtown Sioux Falls Legacy Developments SF City Council Sioux Falls

Corruption, Incompetance and Blatant Ignorance

l3wis 7Comments

After hearing about the settlement yesterday in the Copper Lounge collapse, we got the verification we all knew was true, Legacy and Hultgren were attached at the hip. Duh.

So when you read the headline in this blog post, you probably think I am talking about Aaron Hultgren or Norm Drake, I am NOT. They are beyond help.

I’m talking about the city councilors/mayors who approved the Bunker Ramp deal to begin with.

It is very irritating and frustrating to listen to some of the members of the RS5 blow off the bunker ramp as just a ‘bad decision’ and that they are not perfect and sometimes make ‘mistakes’.

I would qualify NOT giving a movie theater a beer license as a ‘mistake’ or ‘bad decision’. Something that can be easily passed later, and even if it isn’t, it doesn’t harm anyone. The bunker ramp is a COLASSAL F’UP! Taxpayers are currently paying $1.5 million a year in bond payments for a parking ramp that is unoccupied and will be for a very long time. We may have to dip into the 2nd penny to help make these payments.

The evidence and writing was ON THE WALL! There was mountains of evidence that shouldn’t have passed, but out of pure arrogance a majority passed it anyway.

I am still awaiting at least an apology from those who voted for it, but I still think there needs to be greater consequences. They essentially committed FRAUD on the taxpayers by supporting a project they knew would never happen and the current and past mayor are also to blame. There is also a ton of past and present city employees who helped ramrod it through.

I would like to see a recall and termination of all involved that still work for the city. But there is something you can definitely do this Spring. You can make sure that councilors Selberg and Neitzert don’t get re-elected, and if they had any sense at all, they wouldn’t run for re-election (I do know that both of them already have STRONG challengers waiting in the wings). I would also suggest to re-elect councilors Starr and Stehly who opposed this from the beginning.

We all know that elected officials often make ‘mistakes’ and are not ‘perfect’. But when you have so much evidence showing you it would be a bad decision and you pass it anyway, you have to wonder what kind of corruption is going on behind the scenes. Maybe we get lucky and the Feds that are investigating the building collapse will investigate the city for attempting to go into business with Legacy. We can only hope!

Legacy Developments Mayor TenHaken Media Sioux Falls

Thursday Tidbits

l3wis 4Comments

BUSINESS JOURNAL EDITOR BAILS

It seems Jodi Schwan’s replacement may be seeing the writing on the wall and is leaving the Argus at the end of the month to be a health reporter for FORUM communications.

MAYOR TENHAKEN WANTS TO KEEP HIS POWER (THAT HE REALLY DOESN’T HAVE)

It seems the mayor doesn’t think the changes to the charter are necessary, and in some respects he is correct, because if the past mayors and himself would follow the charter to begin with, we wouldn’t have to make these changes. Let’s go over this again, the Mayor is in charge of running the city and following policy, the city council creates and implements that policy. But since him and his predecessors cannot follow rules, we have to make those changes on our own.

MORE SH*T TO HIT THE FAN WITH THE COPPER LOUNGE BUILDING COLLAPSE.

You know what they say, it ain’t over until the fat lady sings, and today we

found out she has yet to sing her song. While the insurance companies settled, the city and engineering firm are still not out of the clear. The FEDS also have to finish their investigation. We still have a few more hurdles to cross. And as you can see, Legacy was tied to the building collapse (DUH) this is why the council was warned about approving the bunker ramp.

Developers Development Downtown Sioux Falls Legacy Developments Sioux Falls

What’s happening with the apartments by Sunshine GS Downtown?

l3wis 1Comments

As you may or may not know, the apartments are being built by Legacy Development, the same business involved with the Parking Ramp Debacle and collapse of Copper Lounge.

I do believe the project also got some Federal tax incentives(?)

Almost every night I ride my bike through DTSF to look at how progress is going on various projects. This week Raven tore down the old building by their parking lot and they have been working on the donor wall at the Arc of Dreams (which is funny because they built a concrete block wall a single block wide, then attached cut quartzite to the concrete block. Why not just use solid quartzite? Weird.

But the one thing I have noticed is the Legacy apartment project has been hardly touched for several weeks. In fact the plywood and studs that are exposed are starting to dis-color with all the rain and heat.

I have a city official looking into the progress and hope to give an update.

Foundation Park Legacy Developments Sioux Falls

Flopdation Park turning into One Big Reefer

l3wis 9Comments

Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad to see there is continued development at Flopdation Park. There was an announcement today that Nordica will expand warehouse space at the site.

But am I the only one thinking after Sioux Falls Taxpayers, Minnehaha County taxpayers, and South Dakota state taxpayers floated millions in infrastructure (well over $50 million) towards the development park we only got a handful of warehouse jobs and some storage for ice cream and cottage cheese?

What happened to all the manufacturing jobs? The Bio-Tech jobs? Good paying jobs in general? You know, all these promises written on wet toilet paper without a signature?

We were buffaloed once again about high paying tech jobs to sucker us for millions in infrastructure to support some pallet humpers.

And it’s the same hucksters that were involved in other taxpayer bailout schemes in our fine community. Legacy developments who is behind the public/private partnership scam with the DTSF parking ramp after skirting any responsibility in illegal asbestos removal and the collapse of the Copper Lounge building is behind the WinChill warehouses.

I think it is time the fine taxpayers of this community send these fine folks a bill for the millions we GAVE them in FREE infrastructure. We know they certainly won’t be using their massive profits to pay decent wages so they might as well pay us back. I’m sure they will come up with another chameleon LLC scam to skirt payment.

I’m still thinking a new casino by Royal River at that location would have been a better economic impact.

Who wants some very expensive ice cream?

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