RAPID CITY, S.D.— 14 public projects in Rapid City got the green light when they city council approved the recommendations of the Vision Fund Citizens Committee. The vote coming on the anniversary of the 1972 Flood that inspired the fund. The council voted 6 to-1 to approve the recommendations. The decision releases more than $12-million for the projects including; beautification at the Bocce Ball Courts, ADA upgrades at the Canyon Lake Little League facility, and artifact storage at the Journey Museum.Mayor Jason Salamun praised the citizen’s committee’s work, adding he’s still hoping to see support for a sports commission multi-purpose facility. Rapid City Mayor Jason Salamun says, “We are working on a way, how do we fund that? And so would have loved to have seen some funds go towards that, but you can’t argue with what they wanted to do. They wanted to spread that out to all these other projects, and we will continue to work hard on the sports complex to bring it to life for rapid city, because I think that’s going to be excellent for our community.”

ADVERTISEMENT

Committee Chair John Kaiser says it wasn’t easy narrowing down 29 applications but he believes the committee got it right. John Kaiser Citizens Vision Fund Committee Chair says, “The Vision Fund Committee put in a lot of time. We took multiple tours, 15 hours worth of tours, multiple meetings together, and so to see all of our efforts, kind of confirmed by the city council, was really rewarding.”The Vision Fund was established by voters in 1972 to use a half-penny sales tax to build what was then the Rushmore Plaza Civic Center. Since then the fund has supported more than a hundred projects totaling over $200-million.