This was what was on a bumper sticker on someone’s car. Not sure what the exact wording was because it was someone telling me they saw this on a car on their way to work.
They asked me, ‘What is that about?’
I was just as baffled as them and said that there have been some people who have mysteriously died in custody and those families are NOT happy with the mayor, but if it is some other beef, I wouldn’t know what it was.
I will give Poops credit on public safety. We have one of the best fire departments in the country and our SFPD keeps crime low. While this has more to do with their direct supervision then the mayor, I don’t think he has done anything to hamper them, and I would give him 4 out of 5 stars on public safety (he may lose this status depending on how he handles the ICE arrests and HiPo saturation patrols.)
The only improvements that I can see would be allowing paid fitness time for the PO’s and doing a better job of investigating petty crimes and burglaries.
While I like to pick on the rolly pollies you can’t deny we are pretty safe in Sioux Falls, and that is directly reflective of our police force.
I think this would be a more appropriate bumper sticker;
‘MAYOR TENHAKEN IS POOR AT LEADERSHIP’
That would cover most bases, and it’s factual and provable.
Well, it only took a few days, but a local politician had to go there;
“We are finding it very hard to get people who want to put their hand in the air and serve,” TenHaken said. “Who would want to serve? Who would want to step up and lead, especially when you see things like what happened in the last 24 hours? Who would want to be bold and be a leader? And what that’s creating is a big leadership gap that we have right now.”
Participation by young folks in local politics has been bad for decades and I am not sure what the answer is. I know that trying to eliminate the city workforce of anyone over 50 in the union ranks may not be the best approach, or trying to compare the recent murder of a political activist as to why people shy away from local politics, or maybe it is because we have a closed government that can’t even be transparent about a mural!
I have ran many campaigns for council, some Repugs, some Dems, each election cycle presents new challenges as to WHO is paying attention and how to reach out to those folks. If there is one constant in political races, it is constant change and you need to adapt. I don’t think young people are as concerned about their safety as older people are at political events. I think what keeps participation low in local government is our low unemployment rate. Why do we have such a low rate? Because most people have 2-3 jobs to make ends meet, and when you are constantly working, you don’t have time for much else, and in your free time, it is highly unlikely you will be watching city council meetings or attending a protest. Because as a right to work state with little rights to organize for better wages and a terrible social safety net from the state, people are forced to work whether it is good for them or not.
Local government participation is low, that has been obvious for decades, but I’m not sure recent events sparked this disinterest, this cake has been baking for quite awhile, and Poops is one of the original chefs.
Poops was a comedian tonight, though I don’t think he realized it. After the invocation (in which a pastor did a nice job of speaking about immigrants) Paul read a NEW statement about public input (Let’s call it the Sierra rule);
The city has an interest in maintaining civility and decorum during the public comment sessions of its meetings and has adopted rules to achieve the dual goals of ensuring the efficient conduct of the people’s business and fostering citizen participation in that discussion, part of these rules require any presenter from making any personal, pertinent or slanderous remarks which include making any personal attacks on any previous presenters.
Why do politicians always confuse the 1st Amendment with the 2nd Amendment? The 2nd Amendment is the only Amendment you can regulate (it’s in the language), not so much with the 1st. he cannot control what anyone says, that is a violation of their constitutional rights. As for slander or libel, that is ON the person standing at the podium. If they say something that is libelous about a city employee, the city can sue that individual. If they something libelous about another constituent, that person can sue them. It is NOT on this body if someone says something libelous at the podium, it is ON the constituent. And further more how can you predetermine if what is said is true or not? I see all kinds of lies coming from the podium, but sometimes it is hard to distinguish (mostly occurs when directors are at the podium). You can put policies in place until you are blue in the face, the 1st Amendment remains unchanged, and conservative and liberal judges have agreed since it was put on paper.
There were also two incidents in recent weeks of 1st Amendment violations in SD. A person at a Pennington County Commission meeting and a person at a Canton City Council meeting were threatened with removal and arrest. The citizens fought back. At the commission meeting, the constituent even threatened to do a citizens arrest of the chair for violating Federal law 🙂
We need to knock this crap off. With a wannabe dictator in DC, this is NO time for local governments to be squashing FREE speech, quite the opposite.
I have made it a priority to tell ALL mayoral candidates that I will be up their asses if they don’t embrace transparency and open the books when they become mayor.
At the same time, before offering any incentive like that, we need to consider raising sales tax across the board if we’re going to continue to emphasize reducing property tax.
In the city of Sioux Falls alone, one penny of sales tax can generate almost $100 million each year. An option to capture that revenue, while at the same time pairing a sales tax holiday to provide relief during the year, seems worth exploring.
Our average of 6.11 percent, coming in at No. 36, is quite low, especially when you consider there’s no personal or corporate income tax to help fund government services.
She thinly veiled her support for a sales tax increase with a story about sales tax holidays. How about we put South Dakotans on a permanent sales tax holiday and implement an income tax. I did the math, and if you set it with certain income levels, 60% or more of South Dakotans wouldn’t pay a penny in income taxes. I have argued if we implemented a income tax on households and private business who make over $100K a year (with exemptions for children) and increased the assessments on commercial and ag properties for property taxes, we would have oodles of money for programs while eliminating the sales tax almost entirely. I would keep sales taxes on luxury items and items over a certain dollar value. Sales taxes on anything we need like medical, energy, food, clothing, etc., would be eliminated. Making poor people pay more in taxes so property owners can get a tax cut makes no sense and is defeating the purpose. I support a property tax cut, but other changes have to be implemented for it to work, and we don’t need to increase taxes on things we need, the government needs to budget differently and we need to go after the tax dollars where they are; RICH PEOPLE. But since they control this town and legislature it will never happen.
Last night while listening to testimony from immigrant activists, immigrants, and children of immigrants one thing was clear; what is happening right now in our country is horrible and riddled with misinformation, lies, and lots of RACISM. About a month before the presidential election, I knew Trump would win. I did the math 20 different ways from Tuesday and the result was always the same. No surprise. The Democrats, while having good intentions, have no follow thru, so while running against the most racist president since Jackson they put up a Black Woman which almost ended up dead last in the last Democratic presidential primary. To say the Dems F’d this past election up is an understatement. To hear all these immigrant horror stories is troubling, and not reflective of our Democratic Republic, which was built on the foundation of immigrants. As I had a lot of mixed emotions last night, after each speaker I kept circling back to why this happened; WE ELECTED TRUMP AS PRESIDENT. None of what is happening is surprising, and the hippie beads, tie-dye shirts and protests with flowers and handmade signs isn’t cutting it, the old way to battle the racist Republicans isn’t working anymore, and you have to fight fire with fire and play their silly reindeer games. But what I kept coming back to after each testimony is this question; ‘WHY THE FUCK DID WE ELECT A RACIST FOR PRESIDENT?’ Heck, even Black and Hispanic men voted for this clown in record numbers. We can point fingers at a lot of people, but I keep pointing my finger at the very people who showed up last night and those on the dais who voted for this rotten person at least once if not three times, YOU ARE TO BLAME FOR THIS SITUATION AND SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELVES. I LOATHE YOU! The racists got what they wanted and you played right into their hands. Do I think a majority of this country is racist? NO, but they certainly are ignorant and mis-informed to vote for a felon, sexual assaulting, racist (and perhaps pedophile) to the highest office in the land, you made this bed, and now you gotta sleep in it. It is hard for me to feel sorry for those on the dais who have played into this BS. I have struggled over the last 7 months, trying to come to grips with a voting public who is more concerned about the color of your skin and your immigration status then they are about saving a country. And there is more to come, a likely recession, high unemployment, homelessness, lack of healthcare, and the list goes on, all the while instituting a national sales tax (tariffs) on the ones that can least afford it.
(I updated the following paragraph)
After public input the Mayor told the speakers to take a moment while they leave the chambers, and in the hot microphone ‘someone’ on the dais says ‘THIS SUCKS!’ (FF: 4:44:15) While it was hard for me to determine who said it, I’m am pretty sure it was Curt Soehl. AND, It does suck Curt and Paul, and we can thank you for voting for this man likely three times while blindly standing at a press conference that stunk of racism and ignorance. It would have been like being invited to a Klan rally and when you attended you felt like you were mislead. You stepped in it big time, you are really living up to your nickname your daughter gave you. Poops tried to blame ‘misinformation’ before the presser as to why he showed. Gee, doesn’t it SUCK when someone isn’t transparent with you, how does it feel? It’s a gut punch when our government hides stuff from us, how does it feel when the shoe is on your feet? My assumption, whoever said this SUCKED, was a bit irked they had to sit there and listen to this, but you are part of the problem. While I commend all those who spoke last night, it was like a bear crapping in the woods, the officials didn’t hear a word you said, or cared. I am hoping this city and country wakes up before the next city election in June and the midterms in November, because this racist economic policy will be the death of this country, and when the smoke clears, we will be different, and not for the better. A light can never be seen in this darkness.
I also spoke on several other agenda items at the meeting last night.
This Wednesday at 6:00 PM, we’re going to fill the Sioux Falls City Council chambers in downtown Sioux Falls and demand our representatives exercise HOME RULE AUTHORITY to draw a line in the sand against government overreach with Governor Rhoden’s Operation Prairie Thunder program.
Basically the SD Dems are arguing since the city of Sux has a home rule charter they can tell Rhoden to go to Hell. Which is partially true on some matters. In fact the Mayor with the Council backing him could tell Rhoden that he cannot use our police force for immigration matters, and they wouldn’t even need to vote on it, the city attorney could just send a letter and the only recourse for Larry Buck would be to have the AG sue the city, which would be messy. Public input should be very entertaining. Public Input probably won’t happen until 8 PM.
l3wis 