Category: Editorial
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You Don’t Look Sick – Suicide Prevention Awareness Month asks Rapid City to Notice. The Data Says We Still Aren’t.
Is this what a month of awareness is for — so society can peer into lives that never asked for the scrutiny? So more judgment gets placed on people who certainly didn’t ask for their diagnosis? Sadly, I don’t think much has changed over the years as far as stigma goes. It’s easy to fund…
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Four Items, One Wednesday: What’s Really in Rapid City’s Special Council Agenda
A $55 million construction contract, a $75 million federal ask, and two different price tags for the same city budget. Rapid City SD – Rapid City’s Common Council meets in special session Wednesday, August 26, at 6:30 p.m. It’s not a regular Monday meeting, and the agenda is short — but the four items on…
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A Chosen Family, Federal Mandates, Oxford Houses, and the End of Public Hearings for Reasonable Accomodations
Rapid City SD- The tension between a neighborhood’s “right to know” and a citizen’s federal right to privacy collided at city hall this month. The result? A fundamental change to how Rapid City handles group living accommodations is now one vote away from final passage — conveniently ending the exact kind of scrutiny that had…
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Radio Silence: Pennington County Stopped Updating It’s Own Incident Page Three Weeks Ago
Rapid City SD – Pennington County has a dedicated page for its cybersecurity incident. It’s the county’s own words, posted by its own spokesperson, with timestamps. It’s also been silent since July 20 — even as the county kept talking to reporters about the same recovery. The Official Record The county disclosed the incident on…
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Shooters on the Sidewalk: Why Rapid City Council President Tamang is Taking a Second Look at Single-Serve Alcohol
Rapid City SD – It started with a walk. Council President Stephen Tamang posted on Facebook about what he found on a recent neighborhood walk: empty vodka shooters, scattered along the route like they’d become part of the landscape. It read like a small, personal observation. It wasn’t. That Facebook post has become the starting…
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The Holding Cell for General AG: Precedent Set for Rapid City – Cartoon
The Holding Cell Playbook: A Rezoning Batch That Passes the Paper Test, Not the Sniff Test The Samco Road Fire Sale: Inside the AG Zoning Rush Along Cement Plant Road
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The 2027 Budget Brief: The Software Squeeze, Stagnant Fees, and Maxed Out Services – The Last Two Days of the Special Council
Rapid City SD –If the first half of Rapid City’s Special City Council Budget Sessions highlighted physical infrastructure and public safety, the final two days (July 29 and 30) exposed the hidden structural costs of running a modern municipality—and the massive revenues left on the table by outdated policies. Here is how the IT, Mayors’s…
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Why is Council President Tamang Revisiting a Two Year Old Ordinance Vote?
Editor’s note: This reporter commented on the Facebook thread referenced below. The Facebook Post Council President Stephen Tamang posted to Facebook this week about finding cheap vodka shooter bottles on a walk with his daughter — calling it a sign of a problem the city has let become normal, and noting that the council has,…