The South Dakota Legislature concluded its second week of session on Friday. This week’s session included the annual memorial service and finished up the reports executive agencies give to legislative committees.

• SB 44 establishes licensing for gaming manufacturers and distributors and establishes a licensing fee. This provision is for “Associated equipment manufacturer or distributor,” any person who designs, assembles, fabricates, produces, constructs, sells, leases, or otherwise prepares a product or component of any associated equipment.

• HB 1004 allows the state Board of Elections to regulate the font size and the petition size of initiated measures, referred laws, etc.

• HB 1003 is a language clarification of a previously passed bill allowing certain entities to make political contributions. The language in the previous bill did not require these entities to itemize those contributions. HB 1003 requires all donors to political committees to itemize contributions over 100 dollars. This bill has an emergency clause to ensure that political committees are statutorily required to itemize contributions from these entities.

• HJR 1001 fundamentally alters how legislator pay is set. The resolution would change the South Dakota Constitution so that rather than legislators voting on a pay raise, legislator pay would be one fifth of the most recent median South Dakota Household income as provided by law. Other employees of the legislature would stay as is and their pay would still be the purview of the legislature. Legislators have not had a pay increase since 1999. Increasing legislator pay would grow the pool of future potential legislators who at this time simply cannot afford to run for office.

• SB 9 would require a fiscal note, compiled by LRC, to accompany both initiated measures and constitutional amendments to determine the cost or lack thereof to the state upon passage.

• HB 1006 is similar to SB 9. The bill would require the director of LRC to deliver comments on any initiated measure or Constitutional amendment no later than 15 work days after the submission by the sponsor of the measure. The director’s written comments under this section shall include assistance regarding the substantive content of the initiated measure or initiated amendment in order to minimize any conflict with existing law and to ensure the measure’s or amendment’s effective administration. This change is in response to the numerous errors in the IM 22 language and would provide more information and transparency to voters for future ballot initiatives. However, the bill also includes a provision that any initiative sent to LRC from the first day of December to the day of adjournment sine die of session the lrc director shall be given 15 days following adjournment sine die to provide comments.

STATE OF THE TRIBES

At the end of last week the chairman of the tribes delivered the state of the tribes address.  Lower Brule Chairman Boyd Gorneau touched on reconciliation, the meth epidemic and urged the legislature to expand Medicaid.

NON MEANDERING WATERS

Governor Daugaard is proposing to extend the sunset by three years, from 2018 to 2021. This week there was an informational meeting about the issue. While the compromise reached this summer could stay in place it is likely this issue will be debated again during the session.

STATE OF THE JUDICIARY

Last week Chief Justice Gilbertson delivered the State of the Judiciary Address. Justice Gilbertson spoke about the rising meth epidemic and the issues surrounding it. However, he was optimistic that the state’s experiment with drug courts is working and urged the legislature to expand the program to include inpatient treatment for the most severe addictions.

EXECUTIVE APPOINTMENTS

On Thursday 3 executive appointments had hearings in the Senate Education Committee. Former state representative Jacqueline Sly was appointed to the South Dakota State Board of Education Standards. Becky Guffin was also appointed to the South Dakota Board of Education Standards and Don Kirkegaard was appointed to be the interim Department of Education Secretary. These appointments passed the Senate Education Committee and will be heard in the Senate on Monday.

VETERANS CEMETERY

Veterans groups have been advocating for a state cemetery on the east side of the state. The bill for the project would be around 600,000 dollars. However, most of those funds will be secured from the federal government. Ongoing maintenance costs would be paid by the state. However, a portion of those fund are likely to be raised privately by veteran’s groups.

Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks,

Rep. Tom Pischke

District 25