SF City Council

Quality of Life Bond mystery

l3wis April 3, 2009 0Comments

Where’s this cool $7 million coming from?

I posted about this over a week ago, and asked the question, ‘Why is this $7 million in the Parks and Rec budget if the city council hasn’t approved the bond yet?’ I know for a fact that Staggers has asked about this at least once in an informational meeting and the finance office acted like it was something that wasn’t on the docket. Yet, when the Parks Director got this sheet (presumbly from the finance office) it had the $7 million dollar bond on there. Hmmmm.

The LOAN would, as understand, help pay for the new Jr. Football fields and upgrades to monkey crappers at the Zoo (or something like that) there has also been mention about a Greenway project thingamajiggy.

I heard the Mayor’s office, Parks and Rec and the finance department are going to ask for these bonds from the council at the end of the summer (if the economy is looking better). That’s the story anyway.

Even if the economy is turning around by then, why would we be taking out loans for WANTS? By the time this request comes into play, the city will be over $300 million in debt, and will be paying out millions each year in interest payments (tax money up in smoke). Am I against the junior football complex? Nope. I’m just against borrowing money for it. I say find money in the regular budget in 2010. We need to stop this trend of putting the city deeper in debt building parks. Water, roads, infrastructure? Fine, they are REAL investments in the future of this city, not football fields.

Let’s get our priorities straight in 2010. Vote for fiscally responsible candidates that know something about REAL progress.

Consulting and Professional Services fees doubling over the past three years for the City of Sioux Falls

l3wis March 30, 2009 12Comments

Tonight’s informational meeting for the Sioux Falls city council could get a little ‘dicey’ to say the least. The audit that councilor Staggers asked for last summer has finally came out, and the results are astonishing. City Hall has done it’s best to stall the audit, saying Staggers’ request had political motives and what good would it be to know those amounts. As you can see below, there is a reason City Hall has been delaying the audit.

 

Consulting fees jumped almost a 100% in two years and the most shocking is professional services jumped from $16 million to $34 million in 3 years. This is appalling on two fronts. First off the city should be spending less, not more, especially in this economy and I don’t care how out of control inflation may be, there is no excuse whatsoever for a $16 million dollar jump over a three year period. It is pretty obvious that there is a lot of hogs at the trough of city hall and Munson has the feeding pail. I hope Staggers takes them to task tonight over the out of control spending, we’ll see if Northside Davey has the gonads to show up to the meeting tonight.

SEE THE FULL AUDIT HERE