Sioux Falls Mayor Race

Is Steve Hildebrand considering a run for mayor?

Steve is no stranger to local politics, he helped with getting Huether elected, he was the force behind the BID group and he helped get President Obama elected as his deputy campaign manager. Steve is no fan of Huether and once said to me,

“I will do anything I can to make sure Huether is not re-elected.”

No love lost between the two I guess.

I received an email this afternoon that Steve may be considering running against the mayor in 2014 from a reliable source. I hope Steve commits, it could make for an interesting campaign season next fall.

I said it during the campaign, and Huether has proved me right, he has never had an Events Center plan

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHMAr-UQmt4[/youtube]

Huether’s Event Center Plan

Gotcha! Huether finally admits that all his bullshit spin and talky-talk was just that;

“There has been no plan presented. There’s been none. There’s only been dialogue in terms of a potential vision of what it could be,” he said.

The dialogue – much of which Huether shared with councilors behind closed doors – included the $99.5 million facility to be built near the Arena and possibly tearing up nearly half of Earl McCart Fields for parking. The plan will also require a public vote. As residents discussed support and concern about a downtown location Monday night, there was confusion about what location the $500,000 would study. Jamison asked Huether for clarification about the location.

“There has been no plan presented to the people,” Huether responded. “So Councilor Jamison I can’t answer your questions because there is no plan.”

“So then to be crystal clear, this $500,000 is essentially another study,” Jamison said.

Like I said to Mike on a repeated basis in emails and on this website, he has NEVER had an Events Center plan, and finally, once put up against the wall by Jamison and Brown he had to admit it.

And what’s up with Hildy stealing Carter’s thunder?

This was a logo I designed for Carter in July.

I’m trying to figure out how this group came from nowhere? Who is really behind it? Hildy? Huether? This is a little suspicious to me. Their first post was August 28th;

Steven C. Hildebrand Downtown is a great entertainment district. Restaurants, bars, clubs, shopping and lots to do. Washington Pavilion, Falls Park, special events and soon, the re-opening of the Historic State Theatre. This is where the Events Center should be!

What’s the best way to win a mayoral race? Spend lot’s of money.

This comes as no surprise, Huether spent 2.4x more then Staggers. As I have said all along, this election was bought and paid for;

In total, Huether spent more than $240,000 for his campaign. Pat Costello followed with $166,000. Kermit Staggers spending more than $100,000, according to campaign finance disclosure statements.

While these numbers are not surprising, this one is;

Huether, a newcomer to the political arena, had more than $97,000 in in-kind contributions, according to city of Sioux Falls campaign finance disclosure statements. It was a hefty amount compared with Costello’s $15,000 and Staggers’ $1,750.

It shows the only real person financially supporting Mike was Mike. Of course he puts his best spin on it;

Huether, who spent $128,000 of his own money on his campaign, said contributing a fair amount of his own money was done in the “spirit of stewardship.”

That’s the biggest line of bullshit I have heard from him in a long time. Allowing you to be our mayor is hardly ‘stewardship’. You hate losing, so you spent as much as possible so that would not happen. It just goes to show how money has destroyed politics.

And this number is a little fuzzy also;

In total, Huether spent more than $37,000 for consulting during his campaign.

That’s interesting, because when I add up all the ‘consulting fees’ it comes close to $74,000. But who knows. Things are often listed twice on the financial reports. Heck, he could have paid Hildebrand a cool $100,000 and we would never know.

Just how much was spent by Heuther on consulting during the mayoral campaign?

Winning elections the good old fashion way – buying them

We will soon know the final amount when the final financial report comes out at the end of this month, unfortunately too late to make a difference at the polls. But someone pointed out to me that the ‘consultants’ were getting paid all along in the ‘in-kind’ donations and were cleverly labeled ‘consulting fees’ with the name of the recipient withheld. I decided to comb through those numbers.

Up until the election aproximately $65,000 was spent by Huether on ‘consulting fees’

This is a rough number, because the financial reports are fuzzy about how you claim these numbers (it seems in some places you claim it twice). The assumption is that these fees went to Hildebrand Strategies who was running Mike’s campaign. It will be interesting to see the final financial report, because quite often, bonuses are paid for winning elections to consulting firms. We’ll see, I guess.

UPDATE: It seems the 4/22/10 financial report was the last filing and the $65,000 is probably the last report.