South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

Taxes

Citizens for Reponsible Sales Tax Munson SF City Council Sioux Falls Taxes

What does L & C water system have to do w/Sales Tax? NOTHING!

l3wis 8Comments

Mayor Munson seems to be up in arms over the sales tax decrease initiative (Argus Leader), which is no surprise, well it kinda is. It will have NO EFFECT on his budget and will have to be dealt with by the next mayor and council. By the time this takes effect, there will be at least 3 to 5 new councilors and a new mayor. Secondly Munson seems to be spinning the story,

Munson bristled at accusations that he hasn’t overseen responsible growth during his time at the helm, pointing to major street construction projects on 57th and 26th streets as recent examples.

“We planned Lewis & Clark for growth,” he said, referring to the water project. “Maybe under their scenario we don’t need Lewis & Clark. I think that’s crazy.”

First off, this decrease won’t take ANY money away from street construction (I’ll get to that later) and secondly Lewis & Clark is being paid by a loan the city took out that is being paid off from increased water rates, not sales tax. We also may receive money from the Federal Government (don’t hold your breath though, it seems neither presidential candidate is too interested in that). Like Rudy Guilliani and 9/11 everytime someone wants to cut the budget, Dave brings up Lewis & Clark. Cut the bull Dave.

As for street construction money being taken away, this is also a myth;

Officials warn that Sioux Falls will continue to lag on new road construction if the tax doesn’t go to a full cent. That, in turn, would hurt economic growth at a time when the national economy already is in precarious shape.Officials warn that Sioux Falls will continue to lag on new road construction if the tax doesn’t go to a full cent. That, in turn, would hurt economic growth at a time when the national economy already is in precarious shape.

It is merely $5 million dollars that will have to be cut from the Capital Improvement Budget (Basically a slush fund that pays for all the goodies (wants) in our city). In fact Munson mentions a great cut in the article.

Munson pointed out that McKennan Park next year is budgeted to receive $615,800 for upgrades.

Huh?! They just received upgrades this year already. Another example of wasteful spending.

And it seems councilor Costello went over to the dark side,

“They are fully within their rights to do what they are doing,” Costello added. “I personally would not sign that petition.”

Why wouldn’t you sign it Pat? I sign petitions all the time with stuff I don’t agree with. I signed the Initiative 11 petition, I signed Nader’s and Bob Barr’s petition to be on the ballot in South Dakota. I think it’s good to let the citizens decide. This is what a democracy is about. Do we want to let citizens decide on what they want to spend $5 million dollars on, or do we want 4 councilors, developers, special interests and a mayor decide?

I think we know the answer to that question.

SF City Council Sioux Falls Taxes

New SF Chamber Chair; Citizen advocates are ‘Negative’

l3wis 0Comments

In the Sioux Falls’ Chamber of Commerce News published in the Argus Leader, the new Chamber Chair Dave Fleck had this to say about citizen advocates and half the city council;

“More recently, the Sioux Falls City Council* voted for additional funding sources for the construction of arterial streets and other infrastructure projects. Instead of focusing on negativity, the council had a vision of where Sioux Falls could be and voted for our future.”

*(Only four councilors voted for the increase with the mayor breaking the tie, this equals 50% of the council, not a mandate or a majority).

This kind of divisive language is no surprise from a Chamber member. Over the weekend it was reported that the US Chamber of Commerce was one of the biggest supporters of the Wallstreet bailout, they are also the largest lobbyist in Washington, spending over $40 million dollars last year in lobbying congress. They like it when taxpayer’s give them money for projects like roads. Mr. Fleck seems to think that it is NEGATIVE for government to look out for citizens first. The amendment that councilor Costello offered to make cuts to the budget instead of raising taxes was very POSITIVE because he was saying we can build these roads without raising taxes. Talk about optimism.

Mr. Fleck goes further with his citenzry attack;

“We need to be willing to risk short-term controversy for long-term benefits.”

There is nothing negative or controversial about asking our elected officials to listen to people who pay their wages and fund this city’s government. In fact I can’t think of anything more negative then apathy.

Sioux Falls Taxes

Gene ‘Montgomery Burns’ Rowenhorst defends the fleecing of taxpayers in SF

l3wis 0Comments

Like a good Munson soldier, Gene tells us that paying more taxes is necessary (Argus Leader);

I would like to put this discussion in context. In March 2008, the mayor and the City Council commissioned a citizen survey that reached 3,000 households in Sioux Falls. Citizens were asked to rate the statement, “I receive good value for the city of Sioux Falls taxes I pay.”

Gene, why didn’t you mention there was only aproximately 1,000 respondents? That’s right, city hall is making decisions with your taxdollars based on the opinions of aprox 0.66% of the population. But if you include the metro area (which will be affected by the arterial roads that percentage drops to 0.44%.) Not a good guage if you ask me. On top of that, we still don’t know who these surveys were sent to, which should worry us even more. Mailing lists are very accurate and specific. You can order a list to go to any demographic within a city. I would be curious what demographic this was sent to. One indicator was a large number of people saying they felt unsafe Downtown at night. This tells me that the survey was sent to 1) Senior citizens 2) yuppies who never come downtown and are generally scared of downtown areas because they watch too much Fox News about inner city crime.

I also take issue with this statement;

That leaves $139 million in our budget.

$27 million is for railroad relocation. This is money coming from the federal government that we need to show as part of the budget due to accounting rules even though the citizens of Sioux Falls are not funding this project. This money cannot be used for arterial street construction.

What Gene isn’t tell you is that SF Taxpayer’s are footing this bill and we will (hopefully) get repaid by the FEDS. In most cases when cities or states foot the bill first, it is rare that the FEDS pony up. and if you think after this $819 billion dollar bailout that they are going to be handing out checks like this, you are freaking nuts.

This is also misleading, and he should have given a breakdown;

That leaves $90 million in our budget.

  • $43 million is in other funds that are restricted for specific purposes such as transit, community development, storm drainage, etc. This money cannot be used for arterial street construction.

    • Most community development dollars are loans that are merely originated by the city. But lately you will notice that the city has been giving handouts in the form of TIF’s and Facade programs. I would be curious how much of that $43 million is for community development handouts.

    Once again the city has told us how they are spending our money, but not how they are trying to save us money. That is what is fundamentally broken at City Hall and the department heads that work there. They are not looking out for us.

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