As pointed out to the mayor in his presser about closing the libraries he was asked why they are not looking at cutting staff. He said he wasn’t going to eliminate staff because we have some of the fewest city employees of a city our size per capita. Why is that? Technology, it takes fewer people to perform the tasks, duh.
But what is confusing to me is where are the cost savings by simply locking the doors for a few hours? Is the library staff going to get their weekly hours cut to 30 hours a week? Doubtful. So where are the savings. So we are going to pay staff for 40 hours a week with closed doors for 10 hours of that time? Where is the sense in this? You are NOT saving on utilities or programming, so I struggle with the cost savings. I would understand if you cut all library staff back to 30 hours a week you would have significant savings, but that is not happening here. We are essentially paying staff for a 40 hour work week when they are really only working 30 hours a week.
I want to clarify, I don’t want that to happen, so what’s the solution? Leave the hours as is, or cut staff.
I still believe the biggest cost savings to taxpayers is to terminate most middle management, demote them or promote them. Labor is a massive part of the city budget (it is approximately 25% of the yearly budget) Even if you cut 10% of the employees you would have a cost savings of $25 Million!
This isn’t rocket science. Companies across SF face these decisions daily, and somehow manage.
Unlike many other services the city provides, extended hours, especially in Sioux Falls for the library actually help many lower income people and transients transitioning into housing get a job or access other services. Not sure if Poops has looked out his city hall window lately (when he isn’t doing interviews in NYC or doing jumping jacks) and noticed the live action version of the Walking Dead going on DTSF. You want to fight homelessness? Find these folks housing and a job, hard to do when you cut off resources.
Sundance believes that Mayor Paul TenHaken or one of his staffers with the City was retaliating against them for seeking to terminate the restatement agreement as it conflicted with TenHaken’s “2026 Housing Action Plan” focusing on accessible housing, a key element of his 2022 reelection campaign and one of the four areas of TenHaken’s One Sioux Falls framework, the lawsuit states.
What do we mean by “accessible housing?” #OneSiouxFalls
Posted by Paul TenHaken on Tuesday, September 25, 2018
Ogborn echoed this.
“They (the City) wanted to get back at Sundance leaving the program because the mayor had not met his goal of providing affordable housing,” he said. “Sundance pulling out of the deal was another hit to that program, and at the end of the day, the City was going to exact retribution.”
TenHaken, according to The Sundance Group’s lawsuit, allegedly directed city officials to prevent the company from selling the units to force them into default with lenders. This, allegedly, was done to allow the City to acquire the project below Sundance’s development costs, enabling the City to sell the units under its affordable housing program and meet public housing targets promised during TenHaken’s campaign.
I have been salivating about a jury trial against the city for years, it may happen. I’ve been told by sources familiar with the suit that the judge may have agreed to a jury trial a few weeks ago but awaiting confirmation of that.
If this does go to trial, I think I will attend the proceedings, it is rare when the city gets sued that it goes to a jury trial, so this will be an exciting one to watch. It also scores just how corrupt this current mayor and his minions are. The city may just pay the settlement to avoid a trial, but I would demand the trial anyway, even if you may lose. The public needs to see how this administration operates, and it would be on full display in this case. I hope this leads to other corruption and fraud suits. Corruption must be punished, severely.
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.
See Paul, I don’t have all bad feelings for yah, I’m starting this post out with one of my favorite songs from one of my favorite bands!
So lately many folks across the political spectrum in Sux have been reaching out to me. Corruption? Open Government? Poops new exercise routine? Close. They have been asking me about MisTaken’s political future and why he is bailing. I told someone, flat out, “Because he can’t run.” I will have more on that soon. But what has been resonating with all these folks is a weird question; ‘Why is Paul so angry?’ First off, I don’t know the guy from Adam, so I don’t do a lot of mental health checks on him, though I do know he likes the Quacktorpractor, maybe ask him? But after the 4th or 5th person called me about this last week, I was like, Gum Dummit! I need to figure this out. So here it is;
I think Paul has been reflecting on the past 7 years and realizing, that in fact, he accomplished nothing except weakening our bond rating, creating millions in additional operating expenses for Rec NO ONE asked for, not stopping the Bunker Ramp, and the list goes on. I would be angry to, very angry. I’m actually surprised he hasn’t been eating broken glass at the meetings (I think they make Werther flavored glass).
One reason I try to avoid political convos on Facebook is because the comments are a cesspool of crap. Mike Zitterich got this friendly email from the mayor about one of his comments;
Mike, I have always been nothing but cordial to you over the years, responding to your emails and never attaching your positions, but your comments online can be quite disrespectful toward me at times. Let’s do better than this. – Paul TenHaken, Mayor of the City of Sioux Falls, S.D
Mike made this comment (which I felt was harmless):
It’s pretty thin skinned to be monitoring peeps comments and emailing that your feelings are hurt. Mike did apologize and feels remorse, but I told him;
He’s not progressive, and that is why the comment pissed him off. He just put out a letter today saying he is not running for office after leaving as mayor. Pretty thin-skinned to be sending you emails about his hurt feelings. I would have left it. He is a politician, it was a political statement, and you are NOT family or close friends, so not sure why he got so worked up about it. He struggles with his responsibilities as a public servant, the main job is LISTENING to your constituents not sending them emails about hurt feelings.
Speaking of the Mayor getting out of politics and going into the private sector I think he will do political consulting and marketing. First off, I would like to THANK HIM for not running at this time for political office, you ARE not cut out for it. Secondly, Poops is really good at one thing, winning elections (mostly with lots of money) he just doesn’t know what to do when they win. I think he will have a very successful campaign marketing business.
As for Poops marching out the door, I guess quite a few directors are going with him, the rumor is that Cotter (Public works director) Thum (Police Chief) Bill Da’Toole (Human Resources) and Kearney (Parks and Rec) are retiring after Poops term. I guess it would explain why they don’t care about all the nepotism at city hall* There are also many others leaving. This is actually a good thing because the next mayor will be able to appoint his team. Not sure if the city attorney will resign or try to keep a job with the next administration? Either way, I think the next mayor should fire him 30 minutes after inauguration. It’s time to clean the Fiddle out of the Faddle at city hall. And don’t let the door . . .
*(Besides Cotter’s son getting the contract to install sculptures at the Pavilion he also got something else from taxpayers. It caused quite a stir in fleet. I guess if the city hires you to work in Fleet and you don’t have your CDL the city will train you for a Class B for FREE as long as you work for them. Cotter’s son took a short job with fleet so he could get his CDL for FREE, but it gets better, they trained him for FREE on a Class A CDL. If you want a class A with the city, you have to pay for that training on your own. And we used to think Councilor Erpenbach’s kid picking up branches for the parks department was a conflict.)
l3wis 