Booming all by itself

Sioux Falls experiences boomtown feel without energy produc tion

BY ROB SWENSON

Sioux Falls, S D , gains about 10 residents a day a rate of g row th fueling a hig h level of construction of apar tments and other residential complexes.

The development of multifamily residential facilities is extremely active and an interesting trend, says Mike Cooper, director of the Sioux Falls Planning and Building Services Department

“The number of apartment units permitted so far this year is double the number of single-family houses,” he says.

Cooper and other officials attribute the popularity of apartments to job growth and an influx of young adults who would rather rent a place to live than buy a house, at least initially However, retirees also are a factor in the growth of multifamily residential facilities in South Dakota’s largest city.

Job growth and the overall economic success of Sioux Falls were among the factors that prompted CNN to feature Sioux Falls recently in a televised series about five cities “where America works.” The segment about Sioux Falls was the second in the series, following a story about Houston

Mayor Mike Huether says the CNN story by Fareed Zakaria gives Sioux Falls the kind of international attention that money can’t buy “CNN provided us a knockout story, and we ’ re really, really pleased by it,” he says.

Huether considers Sioux Falls as a boomtown one without resources such as oil He traces the modern era of the city’s growth back to the early 1980s when Citibank, now known as Citi, moved a major credit card center from New York to Sioux Falls

However, the CNN story focused heavily on Raven Industries Inc., a high-tech manufacturing company whose products include high-altitude military surveillance balloons and the floating likenesses of pop-culture characters featured in the annual Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.

Development Details

At the end of 2013, Sioux Falls’ population was on page 42)

162,300 The population of the four-county metropolitan area was 241,300.

Evan Nolte, president and CEO of the Sioux Falls Area Chamber of Commerce, agrees that new jobs are driving the steady growth of the city.

“I believe that our job growth coming out of the recession is coming back quite significantly,” Nolte says “We are seeing a lot of different economic indicators on the increase ”

The number of paid workers in the Sioux Falls metro area increased from 141,500 in May 2012 to 145,200 in May 2013 and to 146,100 in May 2014, according to the South Dakota Department of Labor and Regulation.

Financial services, health care and retail are longtime cornerstones of Sioux Falls’ economic foundation But industries such as manufacturing are growing, and a healthy agricultural sector helps stimulate regional demand for products, services and construction.

From January through mid-June of this year, the four biggest construction projects permitted by the city were residential projects

The largest was for Dakota Pointe, a 276-unit apartment complex with an estimated construction value of nearly $26 million. The complex is being developed near a new Costco store in the southcentral part of the city

The second largest is a $20 million expansion of Prince of Peace, an apartment, assisted living and nursing home complex in southeastern Sioux Falls

The value of residential and business-related construction reached a record high of $588.2 million in the city in 2013, based on estimates in building permits This year probably won’t bring a new record, but it could be the city’s second-best year, even with a relative lack of large commercial projects, Cooper says.

A new Walmart might end up being the largest commercial construction project in Sioux Falls this year Two new Walmarts the city’s third and fourth are being developed

New Amenities

In addition to jobs, adding high-quality amenities is important to the city’s growth, officials say

“Those amenities are really important to people If you don’t have them, you ’ re not going to be able to compete,” Nolte says.

The new Denny Sanford Premier Center, a 12,000-seat community events center scheduled to open in September, is one of the newest additions to the quality of life in Sioux Falls

Other recently added facilities include the Sanford Sports Complex, which includes a multicourt basketball facility and a fieldhouse Enclosed hockey and tennis facilities are under construction. Meanwhile, the city is making plans to build an indoor swimming pool. PB

Rob Swenson Contributing writer RobSwensonMediaServices@gmail.com