South DaCola

Editorial Cartoonist from South Dakota

Donita Trump Noem Gun Control Kristi Noem SF City Council SFPD Sioux Falls

Roads to nowhere and getting the panhandlers to behave

l3wis 5Comments

Well it’s Monday, and the let’s just say a lot of things run down the hill.

STATE AUDITOR COULD BE IN BIG DOO DOO

The rumor going on in Pierre is that our state auditor acted alone when he rejected giving the governor’s credit card statements to most ETHICAL, partisan paper in town. I guess he was advised that if he continues to deny the documents he could be on the hook for his own legal fees if the state doesn’t win the case. It is pretty obvious to me he is doing this under the direction of the goat killer. IMO he will release the information right before it goes to court, which could be months.

COUNCILORS STILL WANT TO BUY THE RIVERLINE AND PUNISH TRANSIENTS

At the city council meeting tomorrow night, it is a short one, but they are busy coming up with new nuisance ordinances (that don’t solve the problem, only criminalizes loitering which puts the taxpayers on the hook for the justice costs) and they are going to still purchase the Riverline land with just a week delay. More trickery. I wouldn’t be surprised if they have a hidden agenda item that authorizes the sale of the Delbridge collection, because that will be a middle of the night sale that no one will no about until after it is inked.

VETERANS PARKWAY ISN’T GETTING FEDERAL FUNDING

No surprise, it is NOT a worthy project and is unneeded. This is what it has always been, a boondoggle for developers that started with Huether and has continued with TenHaken. Maybe the Feds don’t want to give you the money because not only is the project not needed but it is possibly being built on stolen land. There was a hold out during the Huether administration and I guess MMM threatened a property owner if he didn’t sell. This person was NOT a wilting flower and I have a feeling they filed a complaint with the DOJ. This is likely the reason the Feds aren’t giving the money, oh and our politicians in SD are kinda dumb, and crooked.

GUN TRAFFICKING RING?

Besides the fact that our Police Chief looked like he just rolled out of bed at the latest presser, he tried to claim guns are getting stolen because of a sophisticated gun trafficking ring in Sioux Falls. Really? Is the ATF here helping you out with that? Give me a break. The problem isn’t some made up gang stealing guns, the problem is people are not locking their doors. Thum needs to lobby the council for better ordinances when it comes to stolen property, oh, and the cops need to actually investigate stolen property, it’s kind of part of your job. It would also be nice if you gave the public some information, ANY information at this point would be helpful.

Donita Trump Noem Downtown Sioux Falls Homeless Kristi Noem Mayor TenHaken SF City Council Sioux Falls Trump

Full of more crap than a Christmas goose

l3wis 8Comments

So I was thinking, maybe the solution to our goose problem is shipping them off to Springfield, Ohio? Just keep the residents away from our dog parks. Those folks would have a feeding frenzy. Oh, Donny, the stories you weave.

AND IT CONTINUES TO PILE ON

While a certain dynamic duo in town seems to have the governor on the run with her credit card statements I got a chuckle out of what this news organization(?) had to say about why they are doing it;

COMBATTING SECRECY AND IGNORANCE

That’s rich considering these two hid investor information from the public when applying to be the legal newspaper of Sioux Falls, oh, and got the unethical council and SOS’s office in on your scam. Government SECRECY!? You make me laugh. Also, how do you combat ignorance? Ignorance is the lack of knowledge on any particular topic. So is this paper going to make the public more aware of the corruption in Pierre with their 4,000 subscriptions? I’m dying! Hopefully you will figure out what hair and nail salons Noem has been visiting these days. The public is DYING to know, just don’t give them the info in a gravel pit.

SPECIAL CONTRACTS FOR SPECIAL PEEPS

Well it was like Christmas for certain ad agencies in town last Tuesday at the City Council meeting;

Councilor Ryan Spellerberg brought two separate amendments Tuesday night – both of which passed unanimously and with minimal council discussion. One allocated $150,000 for a marketing campaign to encourage the public to donate to charities rather than to panhandlers.

Yes Kids, instead of actually taking REAL capital and spending it on bus tickets to help get these folks home or a street outreach program that picks these folks up at night we are giving the money to well connected ad agencies to tell us to NOT give to these folks. Talk about government ignorance!

With the recent closure of the Sioux City warming shelter we are in deep doo doo this winter. Instead of finding ways to ignore these folks, maybe come up with a plan for this winter, like NOW! I hate to say it, but I have a feeling we are going to be reading about a lot of homeless tragedies this winter.

I heard next week the council is going to fund a marketing campaign called, “Nothing to see here, move along.” it will be for discouraging folks to come to public input and public meetings.

SPEAKING OF DEAD GEESE

Not sure this ties in, but I don’t care. The city wants to see the entire Delbridge Collection sold as a group. Like I said, could care less about a bunch of dusty monkeys in Lenin’s Tomb, but there is some historic and scientific value to the collection and we should save it. I think we are missing a massive opportunity here to build a very unique exhibit, but instead we have to make sure the Mayor and his friends make money building a convention center we don’t need. SHINY BALL, MUST TOUCH!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Crime Mayor High Crimes Mayor TenHaken SFPD Sioux Falls

I’m not the only one getting tired of the lack of answers from the Sioux Falls Police Department

l3wis 7Comments

This is a common thing I hear from residents all over Sioux Falls, not just lower income neighborhoods;

Sandy thinks more should and could be done.

“As a recent transplant to South Dakota from Nebraska, I’m deeply disappointed by the apparent lack of initiative from local law enforcement in addressing the issues plaguing this area. Listening to police briefings only raises more concerns. Every response seems to be, ‘I don’t know’ or ‘I’ll have to look into that.’ I’m tired of the vague answers. I want clear solutions and a solid plan of action. Enough is enough. It’s time for real accountability and results. Sioux Falls deserves better.”

I warned several councilors and the media that once those scanners go silent all pertinent and relative information coming from the SFPD will end. Trust me, it wasn’t that great before the scanners went silent, but it is 10x worse now. Take Dunham Park incident for instance referenced in the above article. The next day at the briefing the police seemed to know very little, which seemed odd to me because every place I went to someone had a different version of the story.

This is the OTHER problem with closed government. If you don’t tell the public what is going on they will make up their own version of the story. Years ago when the directors didn’t run away from me like I was on fire, one walked up to me after a meeting quite irate and says, “That post you did today about the zoning issue was completely off base and wrong.” I said, “Oh, okay, I can update and correct it. Can you give me the proper information and documentation?” They just grunted and walked away.

Disinformation is worse then NO information. Rumors and gossip gets circulated because you can’t be honest with the public. And it is just NOT the SFPD it is most city departments being led by a militant closed government administration that WORKS at keeping information from the public.

The best way to solve a crime is to get everyone on board with the investigation. Tell us what you know and whey you know it. You never know, a random ‘Sandy’ might just help you solve your crimes. Common sense Chief Thum, Common F’ing sense!

County Commission David Barranco Downtown Sioux Falls Minnehaha County Property Taxes SF City Council Sioux Falls Taxes

Bikes, Bonds and Belittling

l3wis 8Comments

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.

Sioux Falls Sioux Falls Airport Sioux Falls Transit Transportation

Transit On Demand is available at the airport

l3wis 1Comments

I stand corrected! I had a long post written last night about how On Demand doesn’t appear to go to the airport, but it does;

The airport, for example, wasn’t an option. I was instead prompted to take a bus and then a 50-minute walk.

As it was explained to me by a reporter, the app just gives you options and the first option was to take a fixed route or walk.

Uh, okay.

But my bigger concern is the data mining;

Via has its own app that you have to download, and there are quite a few steps to get it all set up,

While data can make the service much better, your personal information like credit card and tracking info should be scrubbed every 24-48 hours. I want to use the service, but not sure I can trust a 3rd party contractor partnering up with another 3rd party software provider (and who knows what other financial services they are partnering with?)

All this Bloomberg Institute of data mining is getting old.

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