City keeps event center siding settlement a secret

The city of Sioux Falls isn't budging on keeping details of a $1 million settlement over bulging event center siding a secret.

In September, city officials threatened legal action over faulty exterior panels on the west side of the year-old Denny Sanford Premier Center. Two weeks later, Mayor Mike Huether announced the city had struck a deal with contractors who built the facility to resolve the matter.

The city attorney's office Tuesday formally rejected a request by Argus Leader Media to see the agreement.

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“As you are aware, the parties agreed to a confidential settlement whose contractual terms prohibited the City of Sioux Falls from disclosing the settlement document and the specific terms of each of the other parties’ contributions to the global settlement," City Attorney David Pfeifle wrote.

Open records advocates questioned the denial and said the city had a choice to make settlement details public when it entered into the agreement.

“I think it’s debatable because this is something that was not a legal action. They weren’t in court over this,” said Dave Bordewyk, general manager of the South Dakota Newspaper Association. “This is simply an agreement hammered out by two sides, and one of those sides is the city, which represents taxpayers.”

Jon Arneson, lawyer for Argus Leader Media, said even if there was pending litigation prior to the settlement being reached, agreeing to keep details from the public likely isn’t in the best interest of taxpayers.

“Legal expediency often overshadows principle, and there are certainly times when it should not,” he said. “Arguably, the public’s right to know government-based information such as this might justify some inconvenience in settlement.”

Arneson said a case could be made that any Sioux Falls taxpayer is eligible to view the settlement without violating the confidentiality clause because they are members of the city and, arguably, a party in the settlement.

No matter how the rules are interpreted, Bordewyk said the closed-door nature of the city’s handling of the siding dispute doesn’t help quell skepticism and uncertainly surrounding the Premier Center.

“They’re quick to include the confidentiality clause without giving thought to what the public thinks about this,” he said. “Taxpayers are legitimately going to say what’s up and what’s in that agreement that we don’t know.”

RESPONSE TO ARGUS LEADER REQUEST