Is Now the Time to Build an EC in an Area that is Economically Challenged?

I just finished reading an article in June 20, 2011 issue of Time Magazine called "Don't Hold Your Breath." It listed the five most destructive myths about what is happening to the economy and how it will or won't recover. The myths are:

• This is a temporary blip, and then it's full steam ahead.
• We can buy our way out of all this.
• The private sector will make it all better.
• We'll pack up and move for new jobs.
• Entrepreneurs are the foundation of the economy.

I am a supporter of an Event Center but I just don't know how one can support the mayor's vision to build an event center in an area of town that will provide no real or concrete economic future for the taxpayers of this city.

Guesstimates by his consultants are pie in the sky promises. A press release by Global Spectrum that there is "interest" by Pheasants Forever in coming to Sioux Falls if we just build it is a just that - an interest, not a promise, not a commitment. Another pie in the sky comment to flim flam the taxpayer into believing that if we build it in an area that offers nothing, they will come. The taxpayers believed the city when their consultants said it 20 years ago when the Convention Center was built and the taxpayers are still waiting.

To saddle the taxpayers with the debt of building an event center in a location that even the mayor's AECOM consultant's report showed a huge difference between economic development at the Arena site versus the Cherapa site is questionable right now. If we are going to saddle the taxpayer with new debt, shouldn't we build it in a place that has the most potential for creating economic development, thereby creating more money to take care of the city's infrastructure needs?

The mayor wants the private sector to put up a large amount of cash to fund his folly location. Well, private sector companies aren't spending  their money on such things outside their own operations. As the article states, they aren't even spending it on their own workers.

I could support a city council who votes to build an event center at the Cherapa site where the economic development potential was identified as over $50 million. I cannot support a city council vote to build an event center at the Arena site where the economic development potential was identified as $6 million.

Let's hope the city council has the wisdom to do what is right for the taxpayers of this city and not to continue to push an agenda that this local economy cannot support for decades to come.

the Miraculous McCart Field Parking Solution

The mayor held a press conference to announce a revised parking plan for the proposed new Events Center, if located at the Arena/Convention Center site.

The press release states:

"The plan meets the additional parking needs for the proposed Events Center as well as improves parking for McCart Park ball field activities and more. It minimizes the impact to the actual ball diamonds, as only one ball diamond at McCart Park will be utilized for parking purposes."

The new proposed parking will take one of the softball fields and provide an additional 300 spaces. The map of the proposed parking solution also shows a private parking lot with a building on it that I believe is the Moose Lodge. I understand that the Moose Lodge tried to sell their property to the city and the city wasn't interested in the past.  I was also told that the Moose Lodge doesn't like the softball people parking in their lot. So why would they want Event Center goers to park in their lot? Maybe they will close the lot off and charge exorbitant fees to event center goers.

It is pure doublespeak by the mayor to say that he is solving the McCart field parking problem and yet he is going to pay for it with Event Center project money. He didn't care about the softball community playing at McCart Field until he was faced with opposition to his plan to take 5 softball fields for his EC parking lot. The Mayor is now on record saying McCart needs softball parking regardless of the Event Center outcome,

It's manipulative of  him to announce this idea right before the Monday night city council vote on which location to support. He does it with the appearance of "it's a done deal,  I want it and this is where it is going." I would imagine he thinks this action might sway one or two of those four council people who favor the downtown location and intend to vote that way Monday night. I hope they are stronger and smarter than to fall for his games.

The mayor is using the softball kids as pawns in his event center agenda.

Another Perspective on the Event Center Location

http://cuprogressives.blogspot.com/2011/06/events-center-and-our-schools.html

Corporate America Trained

The mayor was the luncheon speaker at the Sioux Falls Business Conference - Innovation - A Changing Market Place a week ago and he gave the conferees a "business" lesson. He said he was the "business guy" and he was going to share what he learned over 25 years in business.

He said he was Corporate America trained; he managed hundreds, motivated thousands, spent millions and millions of dollars and generated billions of dollars.  He went on for the next 45 minutes outlining what he believes are the basics in business.

Most of the "basics" are common tips that you hear consultants present in training classes. A few of his comments regarding some of the basics stand out to me:

•  Working smartest and harder than anyone else will not get you noticed. You have to market yourself.  He said there were the smartest and strongest people working at Citibank and Premier and nobody knew who they were.  I find that an interesting comment. I was corporate trained for 15 years in the Bell System before coming to work for the city and working hard and working smart is exactly what got people noticed and what got them promoted. Marketing yourself is not equal to working hard and working smart. You may talk a good game, but if it is just smoke and screens eventually you will fall flat on your face because you are just a talking marketing cardboard cutout.
• When you make a mistake, notify your boss. You should be thanked for it.  That is not what I hear is going on at the city. Three words - culture of fear. He said in city government there is a strong feeling of not making a mistake for fear of the press and the people. I submit there is a fear of him and his reaction.
• If you don't like it here, leave. When you leave, you will be replaced in an instant.  The mayor went on to say when he left Citibank, he was the "golden boy."  I agree with this philosophy to a point. No one is irreplaceable or indispensable. However, there are varying degrees and reasons  why people are unhappy. Some are just complainers and don't value what they have in their job. For others, their dislike for their job or their unhappiness could be because of a new management style or an intolerant boss mentality.  It could be because of something we as leaders do to make the environment difficult. This "just leave" philosophy is dangerous in the workplace and disenfranchises people without further investigation. It's how you lose good people. A "my way or the highway" philosophy is not an admirable "business acumen" trait.  

He talked about giving the city council a book about how to become a millionaire and how controversial it was and that the city councilors missed the point. He gave it to them because he said it was about sacrifice, hard work and discipline. He said, "folks, you are not what you drive." I doubt they missed the point. He believes this book is an example of who he is. Easy for him to say as he lives in the most exclusive residential section of the city and as he builds his new "vacation home."

Yes, his luncheon speech was good for those in the audience who may just be entering the business world. I would venture most of the seasoned "business" people have heard the "basics" before. He always seems to mar the message by his grandiose reflections of himself, however. He has to constantly tell us he is working hard and working smart. He is constantly "marketing" himself.

Another thing he hammers over and over again is his constant reflection on his corporate business experience. It is a major put down to the hundreds of professionals in the city who may have never been corporate trained but have dedicated their entire professional life, education and training to public sector work and are excellent leaders and managers in the city.  It's as if working in the public sector does not count, that somehow it is mediocre.  He comes across that if you are not "corporate trained" you have no credible "business acumen."

Business is business whether it's public sector or private sector. Do you bring value to the public sector when you are Corporate America trained. Yes, you do. Does it make you better than everyone else there? No. You may have come from Corporate America but you don't know jack s...... about government and how it operates. It's a whole new learning curve.

Maybe, just maybe, the mayor should quit beating everyone over the head with the Corporate America trained and business acumen mantra and his personal marketing agenda and move on by listening and try to learn and understand something new. Oh, and maybe listen to the public sector experts once in a while.

His "basics in business" are common sense basics that don't just apply to or come out of Corporate America. Contrary to what he thinks, city government is a business too. After a year in office, he still thinks Corporate America is the only real business place that counts for anything.

I suggest he take a class offered by the city called Situational Leadership Training, taught by T. J. Reardon.  Maybe just maybe, he will learn something new and useful about leading a new "business" called city government.

CIP Comparison - Fire

                                                            INTRODUCTION

The CIP consists of two portions: the capital improvements program (CIP) and the other capital expenditures program (OCEP).The CIP is primarily made up of land acquisition, infrastructure improvements such as streets and utilities, acquisition or construction of buildings, and other improvements to facilities or property such as parks. The OCEP is comprised of vehicles and capital equipment.

                                                                     FIRE

The current plan cuts Fire's 5 year CIP plan by $858,920. Fire's 5 year OCEP plan was cut by $590,591.

In Plan Year 2011, Fire's capital projects were cut over last year's plan by $3,420,683. The significant change for 2011 was related to Project #017015, the construction of Fire Station #11 in the southeast portion of the city to be located at 41st Street and Powder House Road. This fire station was already delayed a year in last year's plan. It was supposed to be built this year. This year's plan moved it out to 2013. In addition, $400,000 for land acquisition for future fire stations was cut in 2011 and moved out to 2013 and reduced by $20,000.

Building new fire stations means a significant impact on costs to the general fund for personnel and benefit costs. Moving these projects out to 2013 and beyond means they will compete for precious dollars in both CIP and general fund dollars with the new event center. Who do you think will win?

Previous Fire Chief Donn Hill was a visionary leader and was very well schooled on forecasting the need for land acquisition and capital needs relating to fire station coverage in the city.  Let's hope the new fire chief is up to the challenge. It looks like he has his work cut out for him in representing the needs of city fire protection.

CIP Comparison

I am going to start writing a series of blogs comparing the 2010-2014 Capital Improvement Plan with the 2011-2015 Capital Improvement Plan. I started looking at the plans in depth after the city identified that there was a $3.8 million unreserved and undesignated and questioned what should be done with the money.

The 2010 Comprehensive Annual Financial Report (CAFR) identified $3.8 million as unreserved and undesignated and the administration started talking about about how to spend the money publicly in the April/May time frame.  City finances are complicated. The city does an excellent job of putting the financial reports, budgets and CIP's out on the official city website for public review. The test is understanding it as a lay person.

The Capital Improvement Plan, commonly known as the CIP, sets out projects for the upcoming year and a wish list of projects for the remaining 4 years of the plan. Projects get deleted and/or moved out or moved up dependent upon priorities.

Here are the totals for the Capital Improvement Plans:

2010-2014 CIP: $472,205,675 (former mayor's administration)
2011-2015 CIP: $387,146,485 (current mayor's administration)

As an FYI, the Event Center was not identified as a city project in the 2010-2014 CIP. The Event Center is listed as a Project 000122 in the 2011-2015 CIP. $500,000 was programmed for 2011 and $500,000 was programmed for 2012. There is no money programmed in 2013, 2014 and 2015 for an Event Center. There is no money identified pertaining to the estimated impact on the annual operating budget (the General Fund) in this plan.

The 2012-2016 Capital Improvement Plan should be coming out in the near future. City Charter 5.11 requires the mayor to submit a capital improvement plan to the city council no later than July 1. The City Council will hold hearings on the projects submitted by the Administration and, by City Charter 5.12, must adopt the CIP on or before the 30th day of September of the current fiscal year. 

The Irony of the Ethics Board Decision

The Ethics Board has rendered its decision and it is time to put the issue of Entenman's conflict regarding his building at Burnside behind us. This has been a very heated debate in the public, sometimes not very civil.  However, this issue needed to be addressed by the proper governmental body and it was - so be it.

This is what an Ethics Board member stated:  "Whatever we've done in that area hasn't necessarily had a good financial outcome for area businesses," board member Bill O'Connor said.  The Argus Leader reported the board based its decision in part on the fact that land values didn't go up after the Sioux Falls Convention Center was built in the mid-1990s and after upgrades were made to Sioux Falls Stadium in 2000.
 
There is great irony in the Ethics Board decision.  Entenman is cleared of a conflict of interest so he can now vote with the mayor on putting the biggest economic engine this city will see in decades in a place that even the Ethics Board sees as having no land value potential.

Although Entenman argued that a new events center wouldn't do much for landowners in the area, he did maintain that it still would be good for the city. "That's where the power of having it there is going to be," he said.

The mayor and his team of 4 councilor followers are hell bent on not changing their position regarding the Arena/Convention Center site. I just don't get the mentality that once you make a decision, you can't change it. It's like they have adopted a stance of "don't confuse me with the facts."

The irony of it all. This would all be funny if it weren't so sad for the city.