Planning Commission

Wednesday Tidbits; New Planning Director, Taxes, Drones & Ice Cream

l3wis January 16, 2019 2Comments

PLANNING on . . . .?

So there has been some talk about who will replace Mike Cooper? First off, the rumor going around city officials is he was asked to retire a year before he planned on. I guess the only person to know would be Mike, oh and Erica, Paul and maybe TJ.

People are telling me that my prediction of Erica Beck being the new planning director is a little off and that she is perfectly happy being COS. And why not? She pretty much is running the city while the Deputy T.J. TypeOver is doing all of the Mayor’s dirty work.

An unusual name came up though, Jeff Schmidt, who suddenly disappeared after the joint jurisdiction debacle. The rumor going around is that he is preparing to take the reins. Talking to other city officials and councilors I get the same, “It’s a possibility.” But when I ask councilors if he could get confirmed, there seems to be some doubt.

I guess we will have to wait and see. Hopefully he will get a new office without urine stained walls.

DRONE ENFORCEMENT, IT’S ANYONE’S GUESS

Last night councilor Stehly with the support of councilors Brekke and Starr tried to defer repealing the drone ordinance, TWICE, and were shot down. Ultimately the entire council did repeal it (Soehl was AWOL). So why the deferral? Stehly said she attempted to contact the FAA but was unsuccessful because a majority of the agency is furloughed. She wanted them to testify or at least provide some information about who will be responsible for enforcing the Federal regulations, and thought it was a good idea to defer it a couple of weeks so we can hear from them. She was pretty much told by council chair Erickson that she should have done the research in advance. Other councilors just assumed with the city attorney that the SFPD would have to enforce the regs, but really no one knew.

And they wondered why Stehly wanted a deferral? They must have had axe throwing on their minds.

PROPERTY TAX REDUCTION

Last night when the topic of the property tax reduction came up, councilor Neitzert got very irate and said that the applicants met the criteria they were supposed to and that is why they got the reductions.

LINK TO APPLICATION

While I have NO doubt that is true (well, I do have some doubts), this isn’t about the applicants, this is about who granted the tax reductions, and it certainly wasn’t done with the blessing of the council. More to come on this.

WE ALL SCREAM FOR ICE CREAM

I guess the only one to bid on taking over the Falls Overlook Cafe was Stensland Dairy. That was easy.

Sioux Falls City Council Agenda, Jan 2-3, 2019

l3wis December 29, 2018 0Comments

City Council Informational, 4 PM • Wed/2

Updates on Audit Reports.

There is also a draft of changes to the functions in ordinance to the Audit Committee. I encourage you to read the red notes. There are some significant changes that I’m not sure are GOOD or BAD.

City Council Regular Meeting, 7 PM • Wed/2

Item #7, Approval of Contracts

While it is common practice to hire outside counsel for bonds, I find it a little strange that the city attorney’s office could NOT handle this. Why? The city is taking a loan from the state. Unlike other bonds, this doesn’t involve private investors on the open market. To put it in perspective, it’s like borrowing a five spot from your uncle. A government agency in the state borrowing money from the state. Why would we even want PRIVATE outside counsel involved? Weird.

Item #43, 1st Reading, License agreement for 5G network. Come and talk NOW because we will only get two SMALL opportunities to do so while the Feds and Big Communications run rough shot over us and the city rolls over like a dog for John Thune in all his majesty.

I feel like I’m downloading that cat video so much faster already.

One of the locations of the new cell technology will be by the Events Center. How much ‘business’ is being conducted while people are watching a concert? Funny how we always hear the argument for ‘Economic Development’ yet we both know this is about loading up selfies faster to Instagram. And we know what our mayor thinks about selfies.

Planning Commission Meeting, 6 PM • Thur/3

Consent Agenda, Item ‘C’ has the wrong designation on documents, which is further confusing because item ‘D’ for Sanford is missing documents on a site plan. I see the NEW version of SIRE is not working very well.

Regular Agenda Item ‘B’. Moving forward with the St. Francis House expansion in an established neighborhood.

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