Public Utilities

1st Amendment Public Utilities Public Works SF City Council Sioux Falls

Country Club needs public street for more parking

l3wis October 21, 2025 2Comments

First, let’s start with transparency. During Item #26’s public hearing in which a private applicant was asking to change parking to diagonal on a public street no where in the meeting did they say who it was and it was presented by the Public Works department. One would assume it is for ONE of the country clubs but all that was said at the meeting was it was ‘for the country club’. Well guess what, both clubs are on that street, so which one? Also, while I don’t oppose the parking change since it is a weird street that only those d-bags use, I found the excuse from the mysterious applicant that they didn’t have ‘land available’ for more parking. Ridiculous! All the country clubs have is LAND! And acres and acres of it! Also, if you don’t have the ‘land’ for additional parking, why not just buy the street/land from the city and make it your own private parking lot? Just another bailout to the rich who don’t need it. I would have said, “You want the land for parking? Then buy it and pay property taxes on it, otherwise, talk to yah later.” and this is what it is about, they want property tax free parking and the council rolled over like old ewes to give it to them, BAAAAAAAA!

Only Curtist the Blurtist voted against it, and my assumption was because he didn’t want taxpayers footing the bill for country club parking. Duh.

I have been enjoying Curt’s rebellion, but don’t fool yourself, this is about supporting a mayoral campaign. Heels thinks he supports her, but me thinks he is Huether’s lap dog*. But Mike may be running for Congress as an Indy. Extra weird. But when you have a corrupt AG vs. a Cajun chef he may have a chance.

*In order for Huether to successfully take the mayorship he must show that the past 8 years of Poops have been worse (I am not going there!) And all Curtist is doing is propping up Mike by dissenting the current administration. I told someone if Curt was so concerned about these things, why didn’t he bring them up 7 years ago? Hey Curt, you are NOT fooling anyone!

1st Amendment Public Utilities Public Works Sioux Falls

Why doesn’t the city own it’s own mil grinder?

l3wis October 21, 2025 0Comments

While chatting with different employees in the Sioux Falls Public Works department they seem surprised the city would be buying used maintainers for snowplowing and spending that much money for equipment that is essentially only used for plowing snow. Maybe this would be the reason why we have leased for so long?

I also asked about collection times and if they would be effected. They told me NO because they pull drivers from Parks and Rec and other departments like Water, and Fire.

But I guess the large purchase irks the employees because they have been begging the city purchases it’s own mil grinder (I probably have the name of the equipment wrong, but what it basically does is grind down a street a few inches for resurfacing). I guess the city leases the equipment and they have trouble getting it because other contractors are also leasing it at the same time they want to use it. Employees have told me it would save taxpayers $$$ and would be more convenient for our Public Works department. As one employee said to me, “And we get a heckuva a lot more streets fixed, faster.” So while $9 million for some snowplows may be a worthy investment, it seems the city’s priorities once again are whacked!

1st Amendment Public Utilities Sioux Falls

DATA Centers drive up electricity costs

l3wis September 6, 2025 4Comments

(FF 19:00)

As you will see from the video, data centers drive up all consumers prices because the electrical provider has to build the infrastructure to handle the load. With a lot of demand it will ultimately drive costs up for all consumers in the region. I am opposed to the DATA center planned in SF joint jurisdiction area because it takes land away for housing AND provides few jobs after it is built. But the effect on the rest of us is not good either.

1st Amendment Public Utilities Public Works Sioux Falls

Somebody is certainly in hot water

l3wis September 4, 2025 1Comments

Anytime I see a warning or notice on the city website I get curious about a cover-up (I really do). The other day the city was warning that folks near Veterans Parkway were under a boil order. The city reported it as an accident with a contractor. I was waiting for one of my city hall moles to call me for the other side of the story. I got that call tonight. According to them there was quite the kerfuffle at public works about how this all came down. It seems the ‘accident’ was partially the contractor’s fault and partially the city’s. According to my source who was getting their information from another city employee (so it’s a bit fuzzy) they said the contractor called the city asking permission to open a valve. The city granted the permission but the contractor opened the wrong valve (maybe?). So partially the city’s fault, partially the contractor’s. No harm. No foul.

Well it didn’t end there. So someone at public works apparently didn’t want any blame on the city and blamed the whole incident on the contractor, so NOW the contractor is facing a ‘unresponsive contractor’ label, which means they won’t be able to bid on RFP’s anymore.

Like I said, 2nd hand info, from a grunt, but it wouldn’t surprise me if it were true, because, you know, the city engineers NEVER F’k Up a city project 🙁

Bunker Ramp

Unity Bridge

Admin building

Midco

Denty, and much more . . .

1st Amendment Downtown Sioux Falls Public Utilities Public Works SF City Council Sioux Falls snow removal Snowgates

City Council defers Snowplow purchases

l3wis August 20, 2025 2Comments

It seemed a majority on the council were suspicious of this deal and why we need to buy these maintainers BEFORE the yearly budget is approved. And for good reason. So the question that we ALL need an answer to is; ‘Was it the city’s idea to purchase the maintainers or the contractor?’ I don’t know, but the more that gets revealed it seems this deal was concocted and pitched to the city by the contractor wanting to ‘rid’ themselves of the used equipment. So why would they need to get rid of this equipment? Long story short, the contractor who leased the equipment had the contract tied to a major developer who is out of the business now. So did this contractor inform the city they were no longer going to do the lease? And while they were at it, did they offer the city this ‘deal’ to purchase the used equipment we have already been paying leases on? Yup, that’s right folks, they want to sell us the very equipment they have been leasing to us. So since they are apparently not in the business anymore and a major investor has passed away it seems like a sweetheart deal for the contractor and ANY investor he may have had. Be warned council, this isn’t being done to bail out the city, it is being done to bail out a contractor. No surprise, while there is nothing nefarious about the current lease agreement, you have to question the arrangement with the developer, the city and what goes on at the yearly ‘High Tea’ meetings. The city council needs to budget for a NEW lease agreement with a NEW provider after a RFP is put out. I hope the council comes to their senses and looks at the current lease agreement and who is listed on it.

Country Club needs public street for more parking

Why doesn’t the city own it’s own mil grinder?

DATA Centers drive up electricity costs

Somebody is certainly in hot water

City Council defers Snowplow purchases

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