Greetings District 4 constituents, Another week wrapped up in Pierre for the 100th session. We have 2 weeks left. This week included legislative days 26 through 29, February 24th through February 27th.
Please excuse last week's short update. I was under the weather on Friday & Saturday.
Good news from the week, Barry & Eli Little of Castlewood won the Leopold Conservation award for the year. Their work on their Blioux River Ranch outshined the competition. It was my honor to recognize them in the house ag committee and also on the house floor. Congratulations to them and their families. https://sandcountyfoundation.org/our-work/leopold-conservation-award-program/blioux-river-ranch
On Saturday, I attended the Republican State Committee meeting in Pierre. I left after the second vote, the vote for vice-chair. I was one of two "none of the above" votes cast for the vice-chair election. We now have an Obama voter as state chair, and an anti-public education vice chair. FYI- the vice-chairs husband is the rep who brought a bill to defund the Huron school district, HB 1224 https://sdlegislature.gov/Session/Bill/26178/280560 . This same rep is now president of the Freedom Caucus. I am not a member of the Freedom Caucus, I doubt I'm on their Christmas card list. There were good people in attendance, but the officer offering left me scratching my head.
HB 1025, the big news from this week- On Monday, day 26, the house rejected funding the new prison. The opponents were well organized. I voted for the funding, we need a prison. I toured it last summer, and, like every building built in the 1800's, it's obsolete. This is not a new idea. We've been working on plans for over 3 years now and have a solid & good plan for the new prison. The opponents offered nothing but a no vote.
HB 1092- We also passed a bill funding student teacher stipends. Good news here as this helps our student teachers, and keeps our best in our state. Finally, a win for public education. Those educators have seen nothing but a full frontal assault this entire year. I was glad to see some common sense return to the floor.
HB 1186- On Tuesday, the 27th legislative day, an attempt was made to defund the "Build Dakota" scholarship fund. I voted against it, HB1186, and it failed. This is a great program that keeps our local kids learning and working in our state, again, thankfully it was defeated. Vote results here https://sdlegislature.gov/Session/Vote/81908
HB 1114- Also, on the 27th day, a bill failed to pass that funded equipment purchases for our tech schools, I voted for the bill HB 1114. It amazed me the people who voted against this. Vote results here https://sdlegislature.gov/Session/Vote/81909
Day 27 was a long day.
Day 28 was crossover day when we started taking up senate bills in earnest. These are the bills that made it out of the senate and now will be considered in the house. This was a welcome change of pace as the "easy" senate bills are moved through first.
SB 83- Day 29, Thursday, was more senate bills. Of interest on day 29 was SB 83. This law changed the penalty for ingestion of narcotics. Several law enforcement officers from District 4 reached out to me about this urging a no vote. I voted no, the bill passed.
In light of the prison not being funded, the Governor created an incarceration task force. They will meet over the summer and we will have a special session this summer to vote on the findings of the task force.
The anti-pipeline, anti-ethanol, anti-infrastructure, anti-school, anti-prison stream of bills continued with HB1085, HB1249, HB1228, HB1025, SB208, SB219. This group "has the bit", and little regard for what's down-range.
Of interest to me was HB1261. I sponsored this bill in the house. It passed out of the house local government committee, then passed the house floor, passed through senate local government and then was killed on the senate floor. In house testimony there was neutral testimony from the towns & townships. They left the room and started lobbying against it immediately. It remains a mystery to me. On the senate floor, opponents linked it to the pipeline and it was killed. Chalk it up to one more win for the anti-everything crowd. You can find the bill here and follow it through to its death- https://sdlegislature.gov/Session/Bill/26069 I saw it as a solid bill one could make good business plans around, and it did not impact current towns & townships authority.
If you are interested you can find information about my votes, or any legislator's votes, here https://sdlegislature.gov/ It's a bit tedious. I'll aggregate my votes after the session and provide commentary on each.
On the bright side, common sense does get a few wins along the way. It reminds me of the smell of fresh baked bread: good for the senses, though only for a short time. The proof is in some of the bills I've listed above. We did get HB1114 reconsidered, and it did pass. We did defeat HB1186. There is other good legislation that we have managed to get through though it seldom catches headlines.
As always, reach out when you're so moved. It's your district, state and nation. Please get involved.
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