Excerpts from recent South Dakota editorials

Editors: Please note that The Associated Press welcomes editorial contributions from members for the weekly Editorial Roundup. Three editorials are selected every week. Contributions can be made by email at apsiouxfalls@ap.org.

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Rapid City Journal, Rapid City, Oct. 5, 2014

Paying for sidewalk repair a civic duty

Living in a city brings both benefits, and at times, burdens.

Residents in a municipality typically get faster police and fire service; they have easy access to parks, playgrounds and pools; their streets get maintained (mostly), and their garbage gets picked up.

But on the flip side, they pay more in taxes for those services; they have to follow ordinances on parking, noise, and various codes; they cant fire weapons or shoot off fireworks; and they cant let their properties become unsafe.

City dwellers also have to take care of the sidewalks in front of their properties, even though the walkways are typically owned by the city and reside on municipal land. That means shoveling when it snows, but it also means repairing cracks or replacing walks that have crumbled away to near nothing.

One can debate whether its fair that property owners must pay for those repairs when needed. We think is it fair, since providing safe passage on sidewalks is simply part of the bargain one makes for living in a city.

Rapid City, rightfully so, has targeted numerous local properties for sidewalk repair this fall, noticed either via resident complaint or through city inspection. Like in most South Dakota municipalities, the city gives property owners a chance to hire someone to fix the sidewalks themselves, or they can let the city pay and then reimburse the government later for the work.

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Excerpts from recent South Dakota editorials