While I am willing to listen, and am all for property tax cuts or at least making them manageable, the legislature will probably find a reach around with opt-outs. Once again, if the citizens need changes in tax policy they have to do it themselves because the idiot convention in Pierre ain’t cutting it;
Update: I guess I am not the only one that sees the scam taking place;
Sioux Falls, like most cities in the United States, is running a growth Ponzi scheme. A classic Ponzi scheme involves someone who promises investors a high return on their investment. But, if the investment is not generating revenue, they turn to signing up new investors and using that money to pay the original investors. This may work for awhile but eventually the scheme collapses and investors lose their money.
First off, you DO NOT want to go down that path as a city, once you get behind the 8-Ball there ain’t no coming back. Many cities across the country who have done this have bankrupt themselves.
On Tuesday at the informational meeting the finance director (even though lately he seems to be working for the Riverline investors and NO on Grocery Tax campaign) said the city achieved a new bond rating. After I talked to a few folks I found out they have been pursuing this rating for years so they can BORROW and BOND for NEEDED infrastructure, like ROADS.
Why would the city want to do that? Because it frees up the 2nd penny for bond payments on play palaces. Take the proposed Convention Center. The bond payments on that project will be $40 Million+ a year for 30 years. Thru August of this year the 2nd penny has only collected $60 million. Let’s say we hit $100 million for the year. That would leave us very little for road repairs. Not to mention all the other debt service.
There is another option, a 3rd penny, which is a hard sell.
You never ever want to borrow for road projects while spending money on crap we don’t need. If this Convention Center passes it will bankrupt this city without another special tax to cover it.
WE MUST STOP THIS INSANITY NOW!
There are options. Citizens or the City Council can refer an ordinance to voters in the next election that would require any bonds over a certain amount (let’s say $30 million for reference) would go to a LEGAL STATE BOND election which requires a 60%+1 passage and not this silly fake advisory vote that the councilors keep parroting. The citizens NEVER approved the Denty, the city council did.
This could work and I think citizens would have 6 months to collect the sigs. Let’s put a stop to this stupidity while we still can.
Not sure if you caught the above meeting, but it was a scorcher. While I would agree with Minnehaha County Commissioner Joe Kippley that Leah shouldn’t be fooling around with past elections, I don’t agree with him asking her to resign in public. He should have wrote her a letter, got a couple of his other commissioners on board and CC’d the media. It was extremely unprofessional, and the kicker is he is the health director for the city. Getting ‘political’, which was what his stunt was, is not the ethical standard I want my health director to be holding. If anything Joe should resign because of his conflicts, and I have a feeling he will AFTER the November election so they can appoint someone. More trickery. Oh, and the commission has allegedly been playing games with bond levies. More to come on that 🙁
COUNCIL KICKS THE CAN DOWN THE ROAD ON THE RIVERLINE DISTRICT
At the council meeting last night the council took the line item out of the 2025 budget and concocted a steering committee to study the purchase. While I’m happy they killed the line item, I am not happy they are continuing down the path which will ultimately have us buying the land. From talking to councilors I got the feeling they were just going to kill it and let the River Rats figure it out, but this must be the compromise. Folks, all this is, is smoke and mirrors by the council. They plan to implement a 3rd penny tax to have us paid for the Convention Center. This is short-sighted. They should implement a entertainment corporate tax on all business with 500 or more employees. If you think this place will have an economic impact on your businesses, prove it, pony up.
Oh, and Councilor Barranco was the ONLY councilor to vote against a property tax increase. Thank You David! That vote proved to me that at least 7 councilors don’t give a rat’s ass what economic position you are in, they need their play palaces!
E-BIKES HAVE INVADED DOWNTOWN
Not really, but some people seem to be butt hurt they are sitting around downtown. They are not junkers, so I am not sure what people are concerned about. Other cities do it this way. I think the only tweak I would make is having the bikes in a mobile unit so they are not scattered everywhere downtown, but like I said, there is a million other things we need to worry about downtown, and a random bike parked on a corner ain’t one of them.
WAS HARRIS DEBATING BIDEN LAST NIGHT?
After the first 10 minutes of the debate last night I thought Harris was debating Biden.
Sometimes what you say is as important as what you do. In the administration’s yearly stab at raising our property taxes (even with property values and housing costs thru the roof) they are now using language that says we basically have a legal obligation to raise your taxes (Item #61):
Background & Objective: This ordinance shows the budgets of the Governmental Funds for the year ending December 31, 2024, and the required revenues and sources.
Notice the word ‘required’ added to the description. There is NO requirement that the city raises our property taxes. Budgets are fluid when you are proposing them, and the city council can amend that budget so an increase would NOT be required.
Within the actual ordinance itself, the language is even more suggestive;
That the sums of money that are listed in Exhibit A attached hereto and made a part of this ordinance are appropriated to meet the lawful expenses and liabilities of the City in fiscal year 2024.
So does the city council have a legal requirement to pass this? NO. The only requirement they have is to either pass it or not and adjust the budget accordingly. They do have a choice in the matter and to suggest they MUST legally pass this to uphold the PROPOSED 2024 budget is a load of hogwash.
This will likely pass with maybe 1 or 2 dissenters, but I hope a couple of the dissenters get together and have an amendment discussion about removing the language that suggests they must LEGALLY vote for the increase.
Over the years when I have seen past administrations pull this stunt where they tell councilors they have a legal obligation to vote YES I ask the question? Then why are they even bothering to vote if they have NO choice?
Cut the crap! There is NO legal requirement to raise our taxes, but there is a legal requirement that our city council acts within the best interest of the public’s coffers, and with one of the worst economic downturns since 2008 and housing costs skyrocketing, that best interest would be to vote NO on an increase and let the administration make the cuts to the budget THEY proposed. Then let them have a poutfest presser calling out the council for doing their due diligence.
MORE FUN WITH THE COUNCIL TUESDAY NIGHT
The council will also get an update on the disposal of the zoo mounts at the informational meeting, then they will be sucked into a series of executive sessions in which I’m sure they will be told they only have ONE option on the matter (because it is easier to bully councilors behind closed doors). It will also be interesting to see if the presentation includes any recommendations from experts.
During the regular meeting they will also be discussing creating an arts commission (Item #63). This is another initiative by the mayor’s office that has been shrouded in secrecy. While I support the concept of more public arts coordination with the city NOT under the current management.
The city’s finance director is pushing for a property tax increase again this year. I found this proposal interesting considering the mayor is increasing the budget next year for pools. The city can only use the money for OPERATING expenses. So while they CANNOT spend the money on capital improvements they can use the money to fix potholes and pay lifeguards.
2022 Property Tax $84.9 M – 37%
2022 Assessed Value, 80% Residential, 37% Commercial
ASSESSED VALUE OF SINGLE-UNIT RESIDENTIAL PROPERTIES, $200K – $317.7K, 34%
As you can see, residential property taxes are the biggest chunk of property taxes paid. In other words we are OVERTAXING residential property owners to subsidize things like $25 million dollar parking ramps for condo dwellers.
When people talk about TIFs or rebates for large developers they claim there is this mysterious ROI, even though NO independent study has been done to show us what that ROI is. I would argue that a residential property owner actually has a higher ROI, besides the taxes they pay to help with street and curb and gutter improvements, they may hire a lawn care company or hire a contractor to do work to their property, creating actual jobs.
I have argued for a long time we have NO reason to increase property taxes each year because of natural growth. If we also started taxing commercial properties at their actual legal assessment (and not a reduced TIF assessment) we would also haul in millions in property tax revenue.
Once again, the city is sticking it to the little guy so the big guy has a small tax bill.
l3wis