Speaker numbers apply only to this recording.
The Spearfish City Council met on March 2, 2026, from 5:30 p.m. to 6:43 p.m. The meeting opened with an invocation and the Pledge of Allegiance, followed by Mayor John Senden’s detailed response to citizen questions regarding the separation of City Administrator Bobby Falcon. He addressed misconceptions about contract negotiations, merit increases, and his own interim compensation, and outlined new procedures for public participation at future meetings. Public comment included six speakers addressing transparency, snow removal, infrastructure, and community celebrations. The council then approved a consent agenda, a sponsorship fee waiver, two proclamations, a development plan for Peaceful Pines Phase 2, multiple ordinances, alcohol licenses, an interlocal agreement, and the monthly bills. A key division occurred on the snow removal ordinance (Ordinance 1409), which passed 5–1.
The Apostle Paul gives us some wonderful words to pray as we begin meeting like this. He says, Do nothing from selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind, regard one another as more important than yourselves. Do not merely look out for your own personal interest, but also for the interest of others. Have this mind in yourselves, which was also in Jesus, who, although he existed in the form of God, he did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped. He emptied himself, taking the form of a bond servant, being made in the likeness of men, being found in appearance as man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Let's pray. Father, help the men and women tonight who are gathered to discuss some business of the town. Have the mind of Jesus. He humbled himself, considered the interest of others more important than his own and sacrificed himself, giving his life on the cross, uh, pay the price we owe, provide forgiveness for our sins. Lord, as we look at his example of humility, Paul reminds us to have this humble mindset in dealing with one another. And so, Father, I pray that you will give us that humility tonight in this meeting. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen. Thank you all. Okay, uh item five on our agenda tonight is the agenda. Uh approving the agenda. I don't have any changes. Is there anything from council? Seeing none, is there a motion to approve? Second. Motion and second. All in favor. I okay, yeah, Larry has joined us. Thank you, Larry. So you can mark him as present. Okay, so uh the next item is uh I wanted to read this prior to public comment. So if anyone had any uh responses or questions of uh that they well, I guess we're not gonna answer questions in public comment. But anyway, I just wanted to respond to some of the things that have been brought before the council and before me as the mayor here in the last few months. So I'm gonna go ahead and read my prepared statement. It's rather long, so I apologize, but there's a lot of things to cover. I've prepared this presentation to set the record straight on many items that have come before this council, city staff and the citizens of Spearfish over the last five to six months. When I made the decision to be a leader in the public spectrum, I understood that I would face criticism and have leadership questioned based on decisions that I would make. That being said, due to misinformation, I believe there are some items that now require clarification. The renegotiation of Mr. Falcon's contract is one of the items that needs to be addressed. To avoid placing our city attorney David Knox in a difficult situation for the initial work on the contract. Councilman Clarenbeek and I met via phone conference several times with outside counsel to ensure the contract had key provisions such as employee unemployee at will under South Dakota law, section one zero one of the contract.